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David Hammond, Co-founder and director, Seymour Sign and Print www.seymoursignandprint.co.uk


What’s having the greatest impact on your business at the moment? Having a clear direction, rather than opting for a scattergun approach. By identifying the kind of customers we like to work with, and the work that we enjoy producing, we’re able to deliver a higher level of service to those customers.


Where do you see the greatest wide-format opportunities? We primarily work on vehicle signage. With the costs of commercial vehicles increasing, and customers looking to retain their vehicles for longer, we’re finding more customers are prepared to invest more into their vehicle branding.


What’s the best bit of business advice you’ve been given? A solicitor once said to me, “If you’re not upsetting someone in business you’re not doing it right”. It’s true - sometimes you have to say no, refuse work, or tell a customer that their idea isn’t possible. Trying to please everyone is a fruitless task.


What would make your day-to-day operations easier? The workshop isn’t particularly well insulated. Given it’s winter, it would be far more comfortable if the landlord would invest in improving the efficiency of the heating.


Your favourite bit of kit is..? It’s got to be the HP Latex. After using solvent machines for over a decade, I didn’t fully appreciate the benefits that Latex would bring. The fact of no outgassing sounded trivial and unimportant, but we’re turning work around quicker and days that would have been spent waiting for prints to outgas are now installation days. Any mishaps during production can be quickly rectified too.


What are you most proud of achieving? I’m still surprised at some of the clients and brands we’re trusted to work with. For a small family business, working from a relatively small workshop, we do punch above our weight. It’s satisfying that we’re selected over much larger companies to supply customers because of our quality and service.


What lesson does the wide-format sector need to learn? Pricing has always been contentious, with the varying overheads for each business there’s no hard and fast rules, but in comparison to other trades and industries I think the signage industry often sells itself short, especially with the skills and knowledge required. Try opening your design programme and see how long it takes a plumber to design their own livery!


VITAL STATISTICS 0.5%


THE ECONOMY, THE ECONOMY, WHAT’S HAPPENED TO THE ECONOMY? THE PREDOMINANT MEDIA NARRATIVE ABOUT UK PLC IS DISTINCTLY PESSIMISTIC BUT THE REAL PICTURE IS MORE NUANCED. THE NET GROWTH IN NEW BUSINESSES IS, IN ITSELF, A TESTAMENT TO THE RESILIENCE OF BRITISH ENTREPRENEURIALISM. HERE’S A SNAPSHOT OF THE STATE OF PLAY IN FIVE STATISTICS.


27th


2.0% +37% 46,000


This is how much the UK economy will grow in 2024, according to the IMF. That doesn’t sound great but the Fund expects some of the UK’s main competitors - notably Germany, Finland and Sweden - to slide into recession. The most buoyant major economy is predicted to be India, forecast to expand by 6.3%. The global economy is expected to grow by 2.9%, roughly the same as this year.


This is the UK’s ranking (out of 31 countries) for private sector investment as a percentage of GDP. British business investment, according to the Institute of Public Policy Research, amounts to around 10.0% of GDP, slightly lower than in the US and Canada. High interest rates haven’t helped with many companies blaming them for reducing their capital investment and R&D spend. Those levels may fall if, as the Bank of England still predicts, it reaches its government target of reducing inflation to around 2.0% by the end of next year.


The expected boost for the UK’s economy derived from the drive to net zero by 2030. The catch here is that, at present, Britain is investing less proportionally to address climate change than any other member of G7 (which also includes Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the US) and its present spend - 1.2% of GDP - is below the World Bank’s recommended benchmark for major economies.


The net balance in British companies expecting business to increase in 2024. The manufacturing sector is particularly optimistic, partly because pressure on non-labour costs is easing. The Accenture/S&P survey found that UK businesses are significantly more optimistic than their global competitors, especially those on mainland Europe.


The net increase in the number of British businesses in 2023, compared to the previous year. After the treble shock of Brexit, COVID, war in Ukraine (and the ensuing cost of living crisis) that is a remarkable figure. In England, the net gain was an impressive 95,000.


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