On the Jukebox Podcast from WP Tavern, Nathan Wrigley talks with Elliott Richmond about a two-decade relationship with WordPress, a surprise pizza business built on WordPress tools, and a growing focus on educational video content.
From b2 to WordPress
Elliott has been developing with WordPress for more than 20 years, tracing his start back to b2 before it became WordPress. A self-taught developer who also worked with Joomla and Drupal, he settled into WordPress and built a career across freelancing, development, and community contributions. Notable early work includes a 2013 advent calendar of code snippets that helped raise his profile in the community. Alongside coding, Elliott is also a part-time pizzaiolo.
A pizza business born in lockdown
During the COVID lockdown Elliott and his wife launched a local pizza delivery service to support their community. What began as a temporary effort evolved into a full-time operation that now employs staff and offers licenses to other operators. WordPress is central to the business: WooCommerce, Jetpack, and a set of custom plugins form the backbone of ordering, scheduling, and delivery.
Pizza Pilot: a plugin for local food businesses
To run the operation Elliott built Pizza Pilot, a plugin that manages ordering logic, scheduling time slots, delivery radius using postcode-based geolocation, and pickup versus delivery workflows. It ships as a freemium product with a Pro version bundled for licensees. The plugin is useful beyond pizza: bakeries, local food vendors, and any small business that needs restricted delivery zones and scheduled slots can benefit. Elliott optimizes the product so he can continue development while the pizza side scales.
Working with Automattic and wordpress.com
A connection through Michelle Frechette led Elliott to Stacey Carlson at Automattic, which resulted in sponsorships for videos about wordpress.com. That gave him early access to features he could use to create educational content. Other Automattic contacts, such as Brit Solata and Jamie Marsland, helped shape the collaboration. The arrangement is flexible: Automattic provides briefs and suggested themes, but Elliott retains creative control and produces videos on his own channel for his audience. He values the trust and the chance to both teach and learn from community feedback.
Educational content and approach
Elliott focuses on clear, practical educational material covering wordpress.com features, developer tools, and emerging topics like AI. He aims to demystify technical subjects such as templating, patterns, template parts, and debugging tools like Xdebug. His videos use plain explanations, motion graphics, and analogies to make complex ideas accessible. Long-form videos are planned with short-form spin-offs for social platforms to widen reach.
Why creator-led content matters
Elliott sees a gap creators can fill by explaining rapid product changes and new features in an approachable way. YouTube comments and community feedback form a feedback loop that sparks new episodes and real-world testing. He welcomes both praise and criticism as ways to iterate and improve.
Creative freedom and production process
Automattic gives creators a clear brief but very little restrictive oversight, a setup that suits Elliott’s preference for autonomy after years freelancing. His production kit is intentionally modest and approachable:
– Camera: iPhone on a simple mount
– Lighting: DIY solutions, like a diffused LED light in a small box
– Audio and monitoring: studio monitors from music production experience
– Editing and motion graphics: DaVinci Resolve (paid for the extra features, but the free version is powerful)
– Scripting: loose scripts or flashcard-style prompts rather than word-for-word lines; he records a spoken brain dump, polishes structure with AI, then finalizes phrasing
Elliott enjoys editing and uses motion graphics to clarify ideas. He stresses that expensive gear is unnecessary: a clear structure and explanation are the core, and camera, lighting, and editing simply support that foundation.
Topics Elliott plans to cover
– Developer tooling and workflows, including Xdebug in hosted environments
– Practical uses of wordpress.com and hosted developer workflows
– How to teach templating, patterns, and other technical concepts simply
– Real-world examples drawn from his projects, including the pizza system and Pizza Pilot plugin
He emphasizes that the main difference between wordpress.com and self-hosted WordPress is the hosting relationship; developers can still do complex work while benefiting from a platform that manages performance and security.
Community, trust, and the future of video
Elliott notes a broader shift toward trusting independent creators to produce authentic educational videos rather than relying solely on internal production. This model encourages experimentation with formats and topics that help users and developers adapt to fast-moving product changes.
Where to find Elliott
– YouTube: elliottrichmondwp (note the double L and double T)
– Personal site and blog: elliottrichmond.co.uk
Closing
Nathan thanks Elliott and points listeners to wptavern.com for episode links, show notes, and a transcript. Through 2026 Elliott plans to continue making wordpress.com videos and developing his pizza plugin and business model.