Myddfai Trading Company

A social enterprise that helps adults with learning difficulties. The business makes luxury toiletries for five-star boutique hotels across Wales, England and Europe.

Learning outcomes

• Finding time to set up effective customer relationship management (CRM) can be difficult despite knowing this would gain sales.
• Outsourcing website design and social media presence can circumvent slow connections.
• In-house infrastructure can lessen the loss of economies-of-scale for micro businesses.

Overview of the business

Established in 2010 after receiving £80,000 Big Lottery grant funding, Myddfai Trading Company has a team of four part-time workers and 20 volunteers who support the production processes.

The owner performs almost all functions within the business, from the accounts to bottle filling. There is a strong green ethos within the business, with substantial recycling and reusing of bottles that they supply to hotels and other commercial businesses.

Superfast broadband adoption

The business currently has access to standard broadband with speeds of approximately 5 Mbps and a monthly cost of £60 – 80. The business does not download much data so considers these speeds bearable.

Infrastructure is in place to have superfast broadband; it needs simply to be connected to the premises, although BT have not given a timeline of when this will be completed. The business does undertake international phone calls, which, if they had Superfast broadband, could be cost free.

Most significantly the connection within the business is unreliable and drops out several times a day, sometimes for hours. Whilst the business can continue to operate filling bottles and so forth, it would be unable to place or receive orders which delays the fast turnaround service the business likes to provide. Whilst the cost of these dropouts cannot be quantified, it does mean that the business owner works additional hours to compensate.

IT skills capacity

The business owner undertakes much of the design element for the business, with two printers on the premises – helping to smooth over delays and a lack of economies-of-scale that a micro business experiences when placing orders for small batches.

The website and social media presence is undertaken by an external business, Pach Business Solutions, who the company knows well. In lieu of payment, Pach Business Solutions benefits from a 20% share of online retail sales. This also circumvents the low speeds available to Myddfai Trading Company as Pach Business Solutions has access to high speed internet.

Alongside printers, the business leases a Mac for £70 a month; it is felt that this is the most effective way to ensure that the equipment is kept up-to-date, as the laptop will simply be exchanged for a new one at the end of the three-year leasing period.

The business also has a PC, but compatibility problems with a Mac mean that Sage is run in parallel on the devices and then backed up to the Cloud every evening. The business does highlight how training or targeted advice on digital tools that would be beneficial to the business would be greatly appreciated.

Use of digital technologies

Whilst the content management of the website is undertaken by Pach Business Solutions, the sale management is completed in house. Around 11 to 12% of sales come from the website; this has increased year-on-year by around 30 to 40%, at a value of £24,000 to £30,000 per annum.

Generally, the business owner finds that trade is more difficult through the website, as it doesn’t allow dynamic conversation that often needs to take place around different pricing, discounted rates, recycling of bottles and so on.

These conversations do sometimes happen via email but usually via telephone, with the complexity of the product simpler to manage this way. In particular, Myddfai Trading Company finds that not all suppliers are geared towards online transactions. Invoices and statements are produced by Sage and can be sent electronically.

Social media

The business has a presence on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, with photos being uploaded of the team at work or other activities. The business has also sponsored a local rugby team and sometimes gets articles written in magazines, but editorials would typically cost around £500.

Design and printing

Label design and printing is undertaken in-house, with the owner being proficient in the use of Photoshop and Light Room. All files are backed up onto DropBox for which the company pays £8 per month for one terabyte of storage.

Business functions

Myddfai Trading Company undertakes many typical functions digitally, such as internet banking, product search, and postage management and payment with the Post Office.

Business performance

The business currently operates at full capacity in line with the staff numbers and equipment that it has, further expansion would require a significant investment in more machinery, equipment, and staff members.

Myddfai Trading Company is reliant on internet connectivity to operate.

The owner is able to work remotely but must be fastidious in backing-up and ensuring that the right file is being used due to the compatibility issues between the PC and Mac. It is felt, however, that access to Superfast broadband would enable the business to try new things such as adding video to social media.

Whilst the business does not have any sales representatives, it is felt that an effective way of raising its profile would be via Facebook as currently each post has between 500 and 2,000 views, 100 of these views link through to the website.

Myddfai Trading Company looks like any other toiletries company until you delve deeper and see online photos that highlight the distinctiveness of the brand.

The owner does highlight that there have been vast changes in broadband-enabled technology and software in the last eight years, which can be difficult for micro businesses to keep track of with no IT or specialist departments to keep up-to-date with tools that could benefit the business.