How vvast got compliance software into the press in 48 hours

A PressWhisper case study: how we found the news inside a Shopify data tool, and what B2B founders can take from it.

On 23 July 2026 the top story on the Business News South West homepage was about packaging data. It went up 48 hours after vvast's press kit went out.

vvast is a Bristol software company founded by Richie Jones. It sits on top of Shopify and turns a brand's product data into compliance and impact reporting. At PressWhisper we built its launch kit around the part that costs money: since April 2026, UK packaging fees for large producers have depended on data, and household packaging they can't back up is rated red, the most expensive band.

Since then vvast has been in The Founder Gazette, and Tom Raftery has booked Richie for his Resilient Supply Chain podcast.

Who is vvast?

Richie Jones ran vvast as an ecommerce agency for ten years. In August 2026 he split it in two: the agency became Weekday Assembly, and vvast kept the name and the software. The software, which vvast calls Commerce OS, pulls in a brand's product and supplier data and shows what each product costs in fees and impact. Ed Pitt, vvast's co-founder and CTO, said it better in the piece that ran: "Our software allows brands to see which products are costing them on fees before they even place an order."

What made vvast's launch news?

The bill was the story. From April 2026 the UK started pricing large producers' packaging by how recyclable it is (businesses with £2m+ turnover and 50+ tonnes of packaging a year), and gov.uk's guidance says household packaging that hasn't been assessed, or where the detail to assess it isn't available, gets classed red. Two producers using the same plastic can end up with different bills, and the difference is what each one can prove.

How the kit went out

PressWhisper built the kit (headline, hook, story, key facts). Then it matched the story to the journalists who cover this kind of thing and wrote a pitch for each one. The platform caps a story at 20 journalists. Richie pressed send.

What happened

Business News South West ran it 48 hours later as the top story on its homepage, under the headline "Shopify-Integrated Data and Impact Reporting Tool to Support Brands Facing UK EPR Fee Changes Launched by Bristol's VVAST". The piece quoted Richie: "The cost of compliance is no longer a flat fee; it's directly tied to the quality of your data."

On 9 August The Founder Gazette, ran the other half of the story: "Bristol agency splits in two and ships compliance software". Richie's line in that one: "Over the past year the two pulled in different directions, and rather than force them to share a roof, we gave each its own." Richie's review, left in a LinkedIn comment: "Thanks Jim we've had some fab press via your 'white glove' solution."

The second kit

By September the story had moved on. vvast was recruiting brands for the European Outdoor Group's SDEX data pilot, where the Outdoor Industries Association had named it a platform partner alongside CircKit. Large producers also had a packaging data deadline on 1 October.

Richie emailed us 55 pages of his LinkedIn posts. In April he'd written, "Compliance is becoming one of the most expensive parts of running an ecommerce brand." He'd been making the case in public for months, so the new kit could quote him word for word. We rebuilt the kit for finance desks. It opens on a number John Lewis Partnership published about itself: the packaging levy added £29m to its costs in the first half of 2025/26 (letsrecycle.com, September 2025). The kit's argument is that John Lewis could put a figure on it and most brands can't, becuase nobody in the business owns the product data the bill is worked out from.

Every quote in the new kit comes from Richie's published posts, word for word and dated, so a journalist can check each one without ringing anyone. You can read the vvast press kit here.

For Tom Raftery's Resilient Supply Chain podcast we cut it again, as a supply-chain data problem. Tom replied in 39 minutes, and after an intro call he booked Richie as a guest.

If you run an outdoor brand, vvast's pilot is at vvast.net/eog. There's no large upfront commitment, and the page says places in the first cohort are limited.

What other founders can take from this

1. Lead with the change your customer is living through. vvast's news was a fee change that had already started, and the software went in as the answer to it.
2. Talk about money. "No longer a flat fee" is a sentence about cost, and it's the line Business News South West printed.
3. Borrow numbers other people have published. John Lewis's £29m came out of its own results, so a journalist can check it in one click.
4. Quote what your founder has already said in public. Dated, published words are already on the record.
5. News hooks go stale. vvast's kit was rebuilt in September, ahead of the 1 October deadline. When the calendar moves, rebuild the kit.
6. Re-cut it for each audience. Tom Raftery's listeners run supply chains, so his pitch was about the data rather than the levy.

If a regulation is about to land on your customers, send it over.

FAQ

What is vvast?

vvast (also written VVAST) is a Bristol software company led by founder and CEO Richie Jones, with co-founder and CTO Ed Pitt. Its platform, Commerce OS, sits on top of Shopify and turns a brand's product and supplier data into compliance and impact reporting. In July 2026 the Outdoor Industries Association named vvast a platform partner, alongside CircKit, on the European Outdoor Group's SDEX digital platform pilot. In August 2026 its agency business became a separate company, Weekday Assembly.

What press coverage did vvast get?

Business News South West ran vvast's launch as the top story on its homepage on 23 July 2026, 48 hours after the press kit went out, quoting founder Richie Jones and co-founder Ed Pitt on UK packaging fee changes. On 9 August 2026 The Founder Gazette, covered vvast splitting into a software company and the agency Weekday Assembly. In September 2026 Tom Raftery booked Richie as a guest on his Resilient Supply Chain podcast.

How did PressWhisper get vvast into the press?

PressWhisper built vvast's press kit around the change brands were facing, with the software as the answer to it: since April 2026, UK packaging fees for large producers have depended on data they can prove. It matched the story to journalists who cover that subject and wrote a personal pitch for each. Richie pressed send.

How do you get press coverage for B2B software?

Lead with the change your customers are living through, then show where the software fits. Back it with a number someone else has already published. Send it to a small number of journalists who cover that change, each with a pitch written for them. The PressWhisper platform caps each story at 20 journalists.

What does "classed red" mean for UK packaging?

Under the UK's packaging extended producer responsibility (EPR) scheme, large producers (£2m+ turnover and 50+ tonnes of packaging a year) pay fees that, from April 2026, vary with how recyclable their packaging is. gov.uk's guidance says household packaging that hasn't been assessed, or where the detail to assess it isn't available, must be classed red. Red is the most expensive band.

What is PressWhisper?

PressWhisper is a UK PR platform co-founded by Jim Edmondson and Jay Abbott. It builds a press kit from your website and matches the story to up to 20 of the 65,000+ journalists it maps, with a personal pitch for each. It's free to start, and White Glove is the done-for-you version.

About the author

Jim Edmondson co-founded PressWhisper after PR agencies quoted him around £5,000 a month, six months minimum, to pitch AVRE Industries, the heritage clothing brand he started with historian James Holland and comedian Al Murray. He took it personally and built the software instead. PressWhisper clients have since been covered in PRINT magazine and on TheBusinessDesk. He's dyslexic and lives in Cornwall. presswhisper.com