In-focus Daysoft doubles profits to £1.32m

Business Correspondent/Personal Finance Editor

Friday 13 July 2012

Scottish contact lens maker Daysoft, the only online seller of daily disposable lenses, doubled profits to £1.32 million last year on a 21% sales rise to £9m, according to accounts just filed at Companies House.

INVESTMENT: Daysoft founder Ron Hamilton said there will be a lift in marketing spend. Picture: Kirsty Anderson

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Founder Ron Hamilton told The Herald the current year was seeing a big uplift in marketing spend, following a £1m investment in new capacity and products in 2011, and Daysoft was now delivering more than 1000 orders a day direct to consumers.

He said: "Around 30% of our business is from former Specsavers customers. Our prices are half those of the high street multiples."Mr Hamilton, who sold his original Livingston-based disposable lens business Award for £30m in 1996, was at Holyrood last week to receive his CBE from the Queen for services to the industry. He said: "She's a very switched-on lady, she had been briefed about the lenses but I didn't try and turn it into a sales opportunity – it was very tempting, but protocol dictated against it."Daysoft added 30 to its headcount last year and now employs more than 200 at its Blantyre, South Lanarkshire site. It last month opened a new sales and marketing office, following last year's investment in another production line and the 'Silk' lens, packed in an enriched solution. Mr Hamilton said: "We have to innovate. "We have got some quite innovative production processes coming through and have had a big spend on intellectual property protection and patents."We are trying to keep one step ahead of the unit cost curve, which has to underpin businesses operating in Europe as opposed to low-cost countries."The group is producing 1.25 million to 1.5 million lenses a year, 95% of them Silk lenses, and sells to optical groups in 26 countries and independent opticians in the UK as well as direct to online buyers.Mr Hamilton said a budget of "hundreds of thousands" was currently going into marketing."This month we are in the in-flight magazines and on the London tube... this year there will be lower capex and more on advertising, it is almost like in alternate years we have to prime the pump with capacity, then sell that capacity."Daysoft sells 75% of its lenses in the UK, where it had to absorb a VAT increase last year. Mr Hamilton said: "The main thing is our online direct supply business is unique. "It means we can grow rapidly without problems from debtors." The group's net debt reduced from £2m to £1.2m.

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In-focus Daysoft doubles profits to £1.32m

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