Product category:
Printing Companies: General Commercial
News Release from: Printing.com
Edited by the Printingtalk Editorial
Team on 27 May 2005
Printing.com's Approach Wins Enterprise
Prize
Printing.com was yesterday crowned winner of the HSBC Award for Enterprise category at the British Franchise Association's (BFA) annual Franchisor of the Year Awards.
Printing.com was yesterday crowned winner of the HSBC Award for Enterprise category at the British Franchise Association's (BFA) annual Franchisor of the Year Awards The company's founder and chief executive officer, Tony Rafferty, was presented with the category winner's trophy by BFA Chairman Sir Bernard Ingham at a luncheon at London's Savoy Hotel
This article was originally published on Printingtalk on 1 Mar 2004 at 8.00am (UK)
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The awards, sponsored by HSBC Bank and the Daily Express, showcase the UK's best-performing franchisors in an industry worth an annual GBP 10 billion to the UK economy.
Companies entering this year's awards could nominate themselves in three categories - the HSBC Award For Enterprise, Daily Express Brand Builder of the Year, and BFA Franchisor of the Year, where the theme was 'support for success'.
Printing.com opened its doors for business in 1998, sold its first franchise in 2002 and is looking to list 175 outlets nationwide by the end of this year, with a franchisor turnover of GBP 9 million.
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Tony Rafferty attributed the company's success to its 'hub and spoke' structure and a centrally controlled supply chain - something that other print shops do not have.
By centralising production, the company can take on jobs requiring giant commercial printing presses - offering a high print standard, very fast print times and at a significantly lower cost to the customer, said the company.
Printing.com's approach is to provide a buying guide, detailing more than 2,000 fixed price costings, instead of following the normal time and labour intensive procedure of fielding individual enquiries, supplying estimates and printing quotations.
Initially there was a network of 14 managed outlets under company ownership, Printing.com moved to franchising only after the systems had been thoroughly tried and tested.
The company devised the strategy of offering its system as a 'bolt-on' franchise that could be run in tandem with an existing print business, a successful move, with 72 'bolt-ons' currently up and running.
The success of the individual franchises can be assessed by the increasing number of employee buy-outs and the rate at which new franchisees are joining the company.
Printing.com is setting their sights high - aiming to become the biggest print chain in the UK by the end of 2005 and to grow sales to around GBP 70 million.
HSBC's head of franchising, Cathryn Hayes, said: "Printing.com's fresh approach and use of the latest technology has helped it carve a niche in a highly competitive industry.
It's innovation and unique structure has also given its franchisees a low cost opportunity to start up their own business, underlining the benefits franchising has to offer and making it a worthy winner of the HSBC Award for Enterprise.
HSBC has been supporting the franchise industry for 20 years and, in our eyes, the successful business models of Printing.com and this year's other winners demonstrates the growing strength of the franchise market." Director General of the BFA, Brian Smart, said: "The Franchisor of the Year Awards recognise the very best within our industry - those who constantly strive for excellence to achieve success both for themselves and their networks.
The breadth and quality of all the finalists in this year's awards have been extremely impressive but the judges felt Printing.com had taken up the challenge of enterprise, both in its business and its approach to franchising in a way that could not be matched.".
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