Market Focus
consulting to courier services – is likely to be in demand. Small to medium enterprises (SMEs) are Britain’s economic powerhouse, generating 50 per cent of UK employment and GDP while opening up new fields in innovation. They also provide a key role for business services firms to smooth the way for expansion while adding value and lifting the load.
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The HP Business Answers SME Index showed that 55 per cent of the 1,000 companies surveyed experienced growth in the last half of 2011 and, despite fears about the economy, a third expected substantial growth in 2012. That confidence was justified by this year’s Budget, which opened up the public sector to private enterprise and introduced the National Loans Guarantee Scheme to boost lending to SMEs. Business owners who seize the chance to branch out will need third-party help to maximise their chances, and there’s a host of franchise opportunities available.
Pack & Send
he business services sector could prove a canny choice for would-be franchise holders in 2012, when outsourced help for everything – from financial
What appealed to you about Pack & Send?
I wanted a transactional business that was going to give me a regular income and could be grown and scaled. I knew it would be very hands-on in the early stages, but eventually I wanted something that would let me step back a little. There were plenty of franchises out there but most of them seemed to be pretty poor quality or to be operating in a saturated market.
Pack & Send is a physical business that is not going to be killed by the internet. I like the concept and the fact that it’s new to the UK. Like all franchises, one gets a territory of an agreed size but as Pack & Send is fairly new I can operate in a much bigger area. It’s a high gross margin business based on service, innovation and delivery and there aren’t many companies nationwide that have our skills and ability – we fill a gap in the market between the high-volume corporate contracts offered by the freight companies and discounted but basic delivery services.
In what way did your earlier experience help? My career has always involved dealing with people, negotiating and trading, so I use that experience to deal with private and business customers alike. I understand the corporate mentality and that helps with some of the bigger companies that use our services. I’m a great believer in doing things
properly even if it’s slightly more expensive and involves a little more work. If you do a good job for people they will remember, and our customers are already giving us lots of word-of-mouth recommendations.
Richard Webb, 52, formerly enjoyed a high-flying career in media trading that took him from advertising agency buyer to managing director at Mirror Group Newspapers. He left in 2008 to set up a media consultancy and a manufacturing business (ShirtStar). In November 2011 he started his Pack & Send franchise in Richmond.
Have there been any especially challenging cases? One of the more interesting challenges was a Tang Dynasty Chinese horse sculpture with broken ears. It had to make a round trip to a craftsman to be fixed – and come back in one piece. We used a custom-made foam bed for the horse that became a re-usable transport case for it. We create new solutions on a daily basis with a bit of lateral thinking and some imagination. There’s a lot of help from head office and the rest of the network but ultimately we have to decide on the solution ourselves.
Describe what goes on in a typical working day We work out both how to pack and ship all kinds of things to ensure safe and timely delivery, but also to keep the costs competitive. We could be dealing with orders that range from £50 for a private individual to £4,000 for a corporate customer and working out how to transport anything from circus equipment to delicate computer parts. We have the means to take away a lot of our customers’ headaches like packing challenges and customs paperwork. I believe all of our customers have been delighted with the service and many have come back – we help solve people’s problems and that’s a great thing to do.
What would you advise someone who took on a Pack & Send franchise? If you want to do something a bit different and more interesting Pack & Send is a fantastic opportunity. And you need to be comfortable with the physical side of it and humping boxes around, running vans and dealing with large volumes of material. You also need to be reasonably practical and good at dealing with people.
What are your future plans? My ambition is to make a huge success of this franchise after which I hope to expand into more branches.
WPA
Dan Wade of Uckfield is only 24 but this January he was named medical insurer WPA’s Franchisee of the Year. WPA’s core business is not-for-profit
June 2012 |
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