Encore Envelopes staff praised for helping out
Sep 4 2010 by Peter McCusker, The Journal
The business, on Hertburn Industrial Estate, makes 2.5 billion envelopes a year – equivalent to 10% of a year’s deliveries made by the Royal Mail.
Its customers include BT, Lloyds TSB, Barclays, Royal Bank of Scotland, the Inland Revenue and Employment Service, with the other half being direct mail.
Mr Croisdale and his two partners, finance director Mike Williamson and production director Dave Cooper, bought the business in early 2007. The company is currently paying off the debt it incurred to fund the MBO.
Mr Croisdale added: “The profitability performance was very satisfactory and this is further helped by the fact that the company has paid off more of the debt arising at the time of the MBO three years ago.
“This has reduced the interest costs incurred and was in line with expectations from the company’s bankers, who had facilitated the deal.”
Ongoing headwinds which Encore face in the coming year are falling volumes of total mail as businesses switch to electronic communications and increased competition from overseas, as well as increasing paper costs.
Mr Croisdale added: “The strike by Royal Mail last autumn certainly has not helped slow down the overall reduction in actual mail volume across to electronic mail for transactional mail (bills and statements), but direct mail volumes are still holding up well.
“As for next year, it is going to be very tough with no real signs of our markets picking up or growing.”
