We’re a small team based in Wem, Shropshire. We care a lot about the people we work with, not just their numbers. And we think accountancy should feel like having someone genuinely in your corner, not someone who only calls when there’s a deadline.
Here’s a bit about who we are and how we got here.
How it started
In 2013, Marie Donaldson took a leap. With two children under the age of two, she left employment and set up Fresh Clarity — building a business that could fit around family life from day one. Not because it was the easy option. Because she believed it was possible to do good work and still be there for the things that matter.
That flexibility has shaped everything since. As the team has grown, so has the commitment to making sure everyone at Fresh Clarity has the same opportunity to actually live their life — not just work through it. It’s not a perk. It’s the point.
”If you're taking a risk to set up your own business, surely you should build it in a way that actually works for you, not against you
Marie
The gap she spotted
Before starting Fresh Clarity, Marie kept hearing the same things from friends who ran their own businesses. They didn’t understand their accounts. They didn’t know what their accountant actually did. And they’d been told, time and again, that running a business meant no time off, never getting paid properly, and treating customers as a source of stress rather than the whole point.
That didn’t sit right. The people she knew had taken real risks to build something of their own, and they deserved an accountant who was genuinely on their side. Not one who showed up at year end, filed the numbers, and disappeared.
Fresh Clarity was built to be the alternative to that. A firm where clients actually understand what’s happening with their money, where no question is too basic, and where the relationship feels like a partnership, not a transaction.
Why Person-First
The phrase “person-first” came from Marie’s background working with social care services. Where it means building everything around the individual rather than fitting them into a system. She brought that thinking into accountancy, where it’s just as rare and just as needed.
At Fresh Clarity it means the client, the human being running the business, is always at the centre. We remember what matters to them as a person, not just what’s on their file. We ask about the business and the person behind it. We build the relationship from there.
Shropshire has always been home. It’s where the business started and where it belongs. working with the kinds of local businesses that make this county worth living in.
What we stand for
These aren’t values we wrote for the website. They’re how the team actually operates, the things that shape every client relationship, every conversation, and every decision about how we run Fresh Clarity.
Positive Impact
We know we have the opportunity to make a real difference to people’s working lives — and we take that seriously. For some clients that means small but meaningful improvements to how they understand their finances. For others it’s a complete transformation in how their business feels to run. Either way, we show up with that in mind every single day.
Sustainability
We’re not interested in keeping your business afloat. We want it to thrive — for the long term, on your terms. That means thinking beyond the next tax return and helping you build something that’s genuinely sustainable: financially, personally, and in the way it fits around your life.
Collaboration
We’re peopley people. The client, the human being running the business, is always at the centre of everything we do. We invest in understanding who you are, not just what’s on your file. We want to know how you work, what excites you and what keeps you up at night. We listen to where you want to take your business, however big or scary that vision feels, and we work alongside you to make it feel more possible. You’re not a client to manage. You’re someone to work with.
Live Life
This one started with Marie building a business around two children under two in 2013 — and it’s never left. We believe that running a business should give you a life, not take one away. That goes for our clients and for our team. Everyone at Fresh Clarity is encouraged to fill their time with what matters to them, because that spirit feeds directly back into the work they do.
The people you’ll actually be working with
When you join Fresh Clarity, you’re not passed to whoever’s free. You get a small, dedicated team who get to know your business properly, and who genuinely care about how it’s going.
Marie Donaldson – Director
Marie founded Fresh Clarity in 2013, after years of hearing friends talk about feeling lost with their finances and let down by accountants who only seemed to appear at year end. She wanted to build something different, a firm where clients actually felt informed and in control, all year round.
With a background spanning both public and private sectors, she brings a perspective to accountancy that goes well beyond the numbers. She’s as interested in what a client wants their business to give them as she is in what the accounts say.
Outside work, Marie’s world revolves around her family. She’s a devoted supporter of her boys and their endeavours, and if she ever did leave Fresh Clarity, it would be to care for orangutans in Borneo. Luckily for us (and perhaps the orangutans), she’s sticking around.
Kim Robbins – Head of Payroll
Helping people is just who Kim is. Before joining Fresh Clarity she was a first responder. That same instinct to show up, be reliable and make things better for people came with her into payroll. She joined the team in 2017 after coming in to sort out her own tax return and, as she puts it, never really left.
Kim gives back wherever she can. She’s raised money for the local charities that supported her mum through cancer treatment, and she holds her family fiercely close. She also spent four and a half years living in a caravan with her husband and kids while their house was being built. Everyone survived. The house is now finished.
Tamsin Lloyd – Bookkeeper
Tamsin is often the first voice you’ll hear at Fresh Clarity and she sets the tone well. She keeps clients informed, supported and sorted day to day, working across bookkeeping and payroll to make sure everything runs smoothly behind the scenes.
Outside work, Tamsin is a fitness machine. She’s always training — running, gym sessions, or competing in Hyrox events. Give her a physical challenge and she’ll meet it head on. The same could be said for her work: whatever needs doing, Tamsin gets it done.
Louise Donaldson – Sales and Marketing Lead
Louise’s job is to make sure the people who need Fresh Clarity can find it and understand what it can do for them. When she joined the team, she discovered something she hadn’t had in previous roles: a genuine work-life balance. It’s now her mission to help other business owners find that same feeling, by taking the weight of finance off their plate.
Louise has a restless curiosity. She genuinely believes every day is a school day, whether she’s getting to grips with new software or learning a new design skill. When she’s not at her desk, she’s crocheting, tending her garden, or reflecting on her years living in Spain and Singapore, both of which, she’ll tell you, had worse weather than Shropshire on a good day.
Highly Rated Accountant Shropshire
What our clients say
Come and talk to us.
Tell us about your business. What you’re building, where you are right now, and what you want to feel different. We’ll listen properly and be straight with you about whether we’re the right fit. No obligation, no sales pitch.
Book a conversation