This period has also seen Fabulosa begin to flesh out its new factory and develop its processes with huge investments in new technology . For the last two years , consecutively , the company has spent over £ 2 million on new machinery and automation however it ’ s had a waiting period to contend with , as James details : “ We are still finalizing developments in the factory , meaning we ’ re still only operating at around 50 percent of our plant ’ s overall capacity . Regardless of this , after 15 long months , we are now in a situation where we are capable of producing the necessary formats at the speeds that we want , in order to meet the forthcoming increases in demand . We are running weekly analyses to understand where there is room for improvement , as we are always striving to utilize

the best possible practices . But in all honesty , from a manufacturing point-of-view , I already feel like we need to start ordering more machines . It ’ s a cycle , you get over the hump and then it ’ s time to start again – that ’ s just business though , we never stand still .”

Growth & investment

A year ago , export sales didn ’ t even account for one percent of Fabulosa ’ s operations , but within the next 12 months its looking to make up around 30 percent of the entire business . James describes this jump as a ‘ positive worry ’ but cites the larger than expected volumes to be a challenge for any company making the leap into global exports . As he expands : “ Even when speaking with competitors , with whom we share good relationships , the

volumes required by the European market have staggered them . It puts a strain on the UK side of things that forces you to consider your priorities . We have pushed the export side really hard , to the point where we may not appear to be dealing with the

“ In the last three months we have made significant strides in achieving our ‘ worldwide domination ,’ if you like ,” he continues . “ We have gained retailers across Europe such as Carrefour , Action and Wibra and we already had Babou ( B & M France ) and we ’ re close to closing with other retailers in Scandinavia , Australia and Africa . We already have in excess of 3000 stores across Europe , but we still don ’ t know the overseas retail market like we do the UK ’ s . For example , we know the sort of volumes we ’ re looking at for a product in Home Bargains , one of the biggest players in the UK for the household category , with 550 stores . With Action , who ’ re described as the Home Bargains of Europe , they have 2250 ! Their first order was for 320,000 units of cross wall products , which was the single biggest order we ’ d received in the company ’ s history . The follow up , after the social media campaign ’ s launch and the positive feedback we gained , quadrupled to 1.4 million units .”

Following its pattern of growth and investments , Fabulosa has also recently consolidated its ecommerce presence by the launch of its new website – a step

Fabulosa

towards future-proofing the business . Postanalysis findings showed that the website ’ s predecessor was losing the company sales ,

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