Member Article

Newcastle furniture care company reveals soar in export growth

Burnopfield-based Furniture Clinic, a furniture repair and leather restoration products company, has revealed an 80% growth in exports for the past two years.

The company’s exports grew from £282k in 2012 to £506k in 2014, an increase of £224k.

Exports now make up 25 per cent of turnover for the expanding firm, which has released figures to coincide with UK Trade and Investment (UKTI) Export Week (May 18 to 22), which is aimed at encouraging businesses to start their export journey or increase their international business.

Furniture Clinic managing director Ben Staerck said: “Exports are now a hugely important part of Furniture Clinic’s business model. Our factory is capable of producing 1,000 bottles of product every hour to ship worldwide to both developed and developing markets.

“Our soaring export growth is the result of hard work from our staff, a strategy in which we were not afraid to push ourselves to the limit to meet demand for large orders, careful production planning and taking advantage of the expertise at UKTI.

“A good distribution network makes all the difference as your distributors can do a lot of the ground work for you, growing sales in your target countries with as little input from yourselves as possible.”

Furniture Clinic was founded in 2004 by father-and-son team Keith and Ben Staerck, and is now run by Ben who has taken over as managing director.

The firm uses state-of-the-art in-house technology to develop and test new products to be used to clean, restore and repair leather, wood and fabric goods and furniture. Products are manufactured at the firm’s factory in Burnopfield, County Durham before being transported to B2B and B2C customers across the UK and as far afield as Asia and the US.

Products range from after sales care kits to custom cleaners and protectors for the furniture, automotive, equestrian, handbag and footwear markets. A total of 150,000 units were exported during 2014.

Furniture Clinic’s export success comes on the back of growth in the domestic market to meet steadily growing demand. The firm has completed a £250k expansion of its premises, increasing floor space from 12,500 sq ft to 16,500 sq ft, facilitating an increase in capacity and enabling the business to take on new staff.

Expansion was partly funded by a £79k grant from the Let’s Grow Fund, a regional Growth Fund programme operated by Seaham-based business services provider BE Group and Newcastle accountancy firm UNW LLP.

Spin off company Handbag Clinic, which restores and repairs high-end designer accessories, has also recently opened a store on Chelsea’s Kings Road, London.

Ben Staerck added: “Our expansion means we’ve been able to continue to grow both at home and abroad. Nearly a third of Furniture Clinic’s client base is currently made up of overseas sales, and we have further growth plans in the pipeline.”