His father was Alexander Carr-Saunders, a biologist and social scientist who at the time directed the London School of Economics.
In 1974, he bought a former banana warehouse in Neal's Yard, Covent Garden in London, with a £7,000 inheritance[2] (92144 in today's money).
[1] This enterprise was successful and enabled him to set up "a hub of caring capitalist businesses which became the model for the fair-trade and eco-businesses that followed two decades later.
[3] He wrote a series of books beginning with E for Ecstasy, and established the "ecstasy.org" website to provide not only general information but specific guides to various batches of the drug in circulation at any given time.
In the 1990s "he fell in love with Anja Dashwood, with whom he collaborated and lived, in the flat above Neal’s Yard, for the rest of his life".