Pathway Scooters

Background

Set up by Christian Matthews and Roy Flood who - having previously worked together for a leading consumer products company - decided they now wanted to run their own business.  Christian and Roy therefore invested some of their redundancy monies in establishing Pathway Scooters in 2002. They had identified an opportunity in the mobility scooters business for a supplier who offered a high level of service and who marketed primarily via the Internet. Together they:

• Achieved a satisfactory level of sales of £34k in their first year of trading
• Converted into a limited company in 2003 and moved the business into a small industrial unit in Horwich
• Began to hire staff in 2007 to support the growth of the business
• Grew the business year on year achieving turnover in excess of £500k in 2008
• Began to look for funding to help them further expand the business

In January 2009, when researching possible sources of development funding, Christian accessed the NWDA’s website and discovered the recently launched High Growth programme. They immediately decided to seek help from the programme as they were planning to make several major changes to the business

Support     

Signed up in March 2009. Received ten days of specialist high growth coaching and mentoring support from a coach with in depth expertise in consumer products marketing. Coaching support began immediately. Working with their coach, the two directors:

• Developed a picture of what they wanted their future to look like by building a vision of the company in 2012. They also identified the structure and investments needed to sustain a business with a projected turnover of £1.7 million in three years
• Agreed and then identified the additional products and services that the business would need to supply in order to expand its customer base and to build major new revenue streams in line with the agreed vision
• Analysed the profitability of the business and of its various product lines - in particular the margins on their leading products and services. This highlighted the need to expand their servicing activities
• Launched their “Gold Club” package – a new, single and integrated product combining Pathway’s insurance, servicing and warranty offerings
• Began to enhance their website and customer database – part of a rolling programme of improvements agreed with the coach
• Identified how their own roles needed to change – and what recruitment would be needed – in order to continue to manage the growth of the company

Outcomes    

• Relocated to larger and more modern premises in Horwich giving the company a new retail showroom and providing sufficient space for further expansion
• Have addressed and overcome the constraints that were beginning to limit the growth of the business
• Increasingly selling via word of mouth recommendation with resulting lower cost of sales
• On-target to achieve the 30% planned increase in turnover for the current financial year
• On course to become one of the leading players in the mobility industry in the UK by 2012
• Begun to create a company with real value in its own right and that is not totally dependent on one or two key individuals