The boss of Brother UK has revealed how Covid forced him to make a “painful” decision over staff redundancies, but that he predicts a bright future for the firm - which still has strong links with previous partner Manchester City.
Phil Jones MBE is managing director of the famed printer, scanner and sewing machine maker, known by many as the 1990s shirt sponsor of City - an “iconic” shirt Mr Jones believes to still be the club’s second best-selling.
In an exclusive interview with BusinessLive, Mr Jones laid out how the Tameside firm, whose parent company’s headquarters are based in Japan, dealt with the global pandemic.
According to Mr Jones, his initial approach was one of caution - and he said because of that, the Audenshaw business has still to this day not taken a penny of Government support.
He said: “I made the decision very early on that our financial resources were very good, we had a really strong balance sheet and good cash reserves. I was lucky in that sense.
“So I made the decision not to draw on any government support whatsoever.
“Although we sent everyone to work from home in the very first instance, we still continued to pay full wages.
“One thing I've learned is you've got to do a bit of strategic sensing - not overreact, and you've got to let situations play out a bit.”
Mr Jones gave it six months before making significant changes following an extensive review of business - which meant 17 employees - 10% of the workforce - losing their jobs.
“It meant we could have a better view of the landscape.
“At the half year point I ran a reorganisation where we reviewed the entire organisation and approximately 10% of our work force departed.
“That was quite painful. But from my point of view, it was about making sure that we've got the right cost organisation for the future.”
He said the pandemic had been a “game of two halves” for Brother, adding: “The first half saw people buy printers and they were almost becoming the toilet roll of the technology industry with how fast they were being sold.
“The sales of our home office printers were going through the roof, at the same time that the sale of our office printers was crashing through the floor, which was interesting.
“Then we were then dealing with the fact the supply chain couldn't restock what we sold - there were big problems at the ports, ships weren't sailing, and all of these supply chain issues were really exposed.”
While Mr Jones is positive for the future, Brother is not yet out of the woods - and he expects some of those issues to continue.
“I am a positive pragmatist. I've been around a long time, and I've been through many difficult times in my working career, including things like the financial crash, devaluation of the pound.
“We’ve got great optimism. The pandemic has given us an opportunity to really reshape the business and reorientate our people, and allowed us to demonstrate our value to the people who work with us in our internal community, and our external community too.
“But there are still Covid-related issues.
“One of the little-known impacts in global supply chains at the moment is there are a lot of empty containers sat in ports in Europe.
“As a result, the ports are very congested. And as a result, we're not getting goods through the ports anywhere near the pace that we would normally do.
“Add into that the difficulties that all ports now have with regards to Brexit, and that means many of our inbound deliveries are delayed by up to one month.”
Mr Jones, who has spoken in the past about how an arson attack led him to becoming MD of the £112m business, also touched on the firm’s relationship with City.
Brother has a long-running connection with the club currently sitting top of the Premier League, having appeared as the main sponsor on the iconic sky blue shirts between 1987 and 1999.
The partnership was certainly helped by City fans Noel and Liam Gallagher, who did various photoshoots wearing the shirts - promotions that mean fans still wear, buy and look out for the retro shirts to this day.
Mr Jones said: “We look back very fondly on that period. It was special.
“When I joined the company in ‘94, obviously that sponsorship was still in play, and I used to go to Maine Road and do some of the Man of the Match awards, which was absolutely fabulous.
“But all good things must come to an end. It served us so well. I think what's amazing is that even today, the fans still associate Brother with the club.
“I still believe it's the second best-selling shirt in-store.”
He said the images of the former Oasis pair are now “iconic”, adding: “It’s over 20 years since we finished that sponsorship, but actually, those pictures still appear regularly in the media, and people still talk about them.
“I think it did a really good job for us. And I wish the club ever so well.”
Sheikh Mansour bought the club in 2008, and since then, it has gone on to achieve astonishing success, winning trophy after trophy.
But Mr Jones said he wasn’t bitter that the takeover came just years after the Brother logo was removed from the shirts, in 1999.
He said: “It's fantastic that they did get that new sponsorship, and they've gone to this amazing success. I don't think we could actually afford to be the shirt sponsor nowadays, in all honesty.”
As well as an obvious fondness for City, Mr Jones also had kind words for Manchester itself - and its business community.
“We've been here since ‘68, so we've got our roots firmly down - and there's no plan to change that right now.
“What I love about Manchester most is actually as a business community, people are very supportive of each other, and it's very easy to get things done and to get connected with people.
“It's a very supportive community compared to the South, where there's still a great competitiveness and perhaps an arch rivalry sometimes.
“Here in Greater Manchester and the North West, people are actually far more open to collaboration, and actually lifting the region as a whole, as an entire community.
“I've always liked that and hopefully I've been adopted now after being up here since 1995.”
