Under New Management
An Interview with Love Her Wild
Many organisations working on inclusion in the outdoors are founded by a small group of people or a solo founder. But how do you navigate handing it on if the time comes to move on to other projects? In this article we talk to Bex Band and Fiona Orrell from women’s outdoor community Love Her Wild about how they navigated this transition.
This article is part of a series exploring themes of resilience in organisations working on inclusion in the outdoors. Including interviews with leaders who have scaled back, paused their work, closed, sought out new partnerships, pivoted and brought on new leadership.
You can find more articles here. This article is the fifth in the series.
What is Love Her Wild?
FIONA: Love Her Wild is a not-for-profit women’s adventure community. It was established by Bex back in 2017, so we’re just coming up on 10 years old. We create opportunities for women to get outdoors through grants, training and gear, and increase people’s skills and confidence in the outdoors. We’ve got a following of around 80,000 women across the UK, and we currently take approximately 4,000 women on free meetups in local regions across the UK, run by around 120 volunteers. We also take women on trips all over the UK and a handful of adventures overseas as well.
Bex, how and why did you start Love Her Wild?
BEX: I got into the outdoors quite late in life, and signed up to do some big adventures and joined some courses and clubs to improve my skills. However I found out I was almost always the only woman in the group. I also had a particularly bad experience doing my expedition leader qualification, where I experienced a lot of sexism from the other participants, and also at times from the assessor. Off the back of that I launched Love Her Wild, which began just as a Facebook group. My initial purpose was just to try and connect with other women, and the group just really snowballed from there.
Fiona, can you tell me about how you got involved in Love Her Wild?
FIONA: I met Bex at an event in 2017 and was really inspired by everything she said. She invited me to join the next Wild Weekend, and then I volunteered to set up the Lancashire group. I just loved meeting random strangers and going for a walk out in nature. My passion for the group really grew, and I somehow, with Bex’s support, volunteered myself to set up the North Weekend. Over time I got involved in different projects that we’ve run and increased my involvement over time.
Bex, how did you know Fiona would be the right person to take on Love Her Wild?
BEX: I just knew! When you run an organisation that big, you get a lot of people coming to you saying they have an idea for something, and I’d always say yes. I found that naturally people would just drop off or get busy or their enthusiasm would wane. But with Fiona that never happened – she always came back with more enthusiasm and over the years became my right-hand woman. So when I started to think about stepping back, Fiona was the person in my mind to take it on.
FIONA: It was a shock, but also a dream come true, because I love the community so much. I couldn’t even think that I was stepping into Bex’s shoes because I’m completely different to her, so I had to put that straight out of my head. I realised I needed to just be myself in the role and make my way forwards as best as you can. It helps that we’ve got such an amazing team – the staff bring so much to their individual roles and the volunteers are all so passionate.
How did you know it was the right time to hand over the reins as a founder?
BEX: I feel like, to be honest, there’s never a right time. It's really hard when you grow something and build it, and it becomes so ingrained in your life. I felt like I'd reached a point where I could have just kept going for like another 10 years, but I also felt like I noticed I wasn't chasing opportunities as much as I was before, and I just didn't have the same level of energy as I did, and it felt like it was like a disservice to the community. There's so many people involved in Love Her Wild that it just became about more than just me, and from a personal level I was ready to do something different.
The right thing for the community was to have someone different step into that role, and Fiona is a phenomenal leader and I think she's exactly what the community needed for this next phase. We're very different, but I think I think it's a good thing - I'm a real ideas, saying ‘yes’ to everything, person, but Fiona is incredible at being a bit more methodical, building the training and the partnerships.
Can you talk a little bit more about how the transition took place?
BEX: We had a handover over the course of a year. Fiona was already doing a bit of work for Love Her Wild, and then gradually over the course of the year I would bring her in on the different phases and the different things that happen. Fiona has run businesses before so she wasn’t learning everything from scratch, and she already knew a lot of people.
FIONA: Getting involved in the finances was the final major transition that I hadn't been involved in before, and even though we're a small organisation, there's so many layers to Love Her Wild. Bex stepped back in January 2025 and the last year has been a case of taking the reins and experiencing myself in that role for the first time, and getting used to working with the staff team in a slightly different dynamic. At the end of last year I started to feel like I was really working on my own Love Her Wild projects.
How did you communicate the changes to the community members?
FIONA: Bex sent out a message reinforcing how much I'd been involved in the background for so long, so that people didn't suddenly think that things were going to change. Overall it went fairly smoothly, but that's partly down to the help of the community managers who look after the volunteers and the way that they communicate everything to the volunteer team. I think from the volunteers' point of view they needed to feel a sense of stability that I wasn't somebody that was coming in and doing everything differently.
Is there anything you’d do differently if you did it again?
BEX: No, can't think of a single thing. I feel like passing it on is something I've seen a lot of founders really struggle with, and I think a lot of founders believe that they're irreplaceable because you're so ingrained in what you're doing. I've seen several really fantastic organizations shut down in recent years because whoever's running it can't get over that hurdle. I realized that once you let go of the idea of it being exactly the same, and actually recognize that a new person will bring new things, and it will change and evolve, and that's not a bad thing, it can be a really positive thing. I really love that I get to still be a part of Love Her Wild, and see all the amazing things that Fiona and the team are doing.
What advice would you give to someone else thinking about taking the same step?
BEX: Trust the person that you're handing over to and give them space. I felt like that was a really important part of the process. As much as I was there to support Fiona, I also didn't want to be breathing down her neck. I gave her space to work it out herself and to get a feel for the community.
FIONA: I think it’s important to have no regrets, just go for it, and don't be afraid to fail or to make mistakes. Don't let that fear stand in the way – just put yourself out there and see where the path leads.
Where is Love Her Wild going next?
FIONA: I want to really push on with supporting more women in leadership, because we are still massively in the minority. We need to be setting an example for the next generation, so we’re going to put energy into supporting women through outdoor leadership qualifications. I also see that a way to strengthen our position in the outdoor scene is by connecting with larger organizations and governing bodies. I’m hoping this will help us strengthen our internal systems and support our volunteers by opening up more opportunities.
How can people find out more about your work?
You can find out more about our regional groups and adventures on the Love Her Wild website, Instagram and Facebook page.
Do you have any calls to action for how people can get involved or support your work?
Join an Adventure! Check out the Adventures section on the Love Her Wild website, or find your local Love Her Wild group and come along to a free meetup.
Share our online Facebook Community with a friend, sister or colleague looking to get outdoors with like-minded women.
If you work in the outdoor sector and would like to explore possibilities to create more leadership pathways for women, please connect with Fiona via the website.
If you’ve enjoyed this article you might also enjoy reading the other articles in the series, including “Taking a break as solo founder – an Interview with Queer Out Here” and “Scaling back not scaling up - An interview with Molly from the UK Paraclimbing Collective”.
