Customer service is the key for celebrating family firm

A FAMILY-RUN business is celebrating its 21st anniversary this July.

Since starting out in the Hythe area of Colchester two decades ago, Barry Bruce’s company, Adler Business Systems, has not looked back and now has a turnover of more than £1million a year.

Barry’s wife, Beverley, joined him at the company and all three of their children, Craig, Luke and Shelley, are also on board.

The company provides customers with everything they need for the office – from tables and chairs and all stationery items to coffee, tea and even cleaning
supplies.

“I was working for Triumph Adler as a senior sales executive, but I really wanted to see if I could go it alone. “I pretty much started with nothing, really, and I just built it up from there. “Our children were very small, so it was a bit of a scary time, but I knew I had to do it,” he said.

He recalls he and his wife arguing over whether they should order ten boxes of paper.
“We had a very serious discussion about whether this was just too much and if we would be left saddled with it and now we regularly have 20,000 boxes the demand is so high. It seems silly, really, that we were so concerned at the start,” says Barry.

Adler Business Systems moved to Mersea, where the family live, within 18 months and in 2002 moved to Waldegrave Business Park, where purpose-built units replaced pig sheds.
“We wondered how we were going to fill the space, but it proved pretty easy,” says Barry’s son Luke, who joined the company from college seven years ago.

He says the most important thing is customer service.
“We do all our own deliveries. My brother and sister are two of our drivers and we take it very seriously. “All of the orders are taken on the phone, so for the customer the delivery person is the only contact they get with you face-toface. “If they feel they have not been treated properly, they won’t order again. It is a simple as that,” he adds.

The company is now looking to the next two decades, with plans to allow online customers to pay directly by card and a re-launch of their website in the autumn.