A message from Jean-Henri Beukes
2019 saw another strong year of fiscal growth for Ecocleen, with an impressive number of contract wins and extensions over the 12 month period. During this time, we have seen the signing of two new franchises and the exit of three, as well as the £2.5 million acquisition of Regency Cleaning Company. This deal has brought in added revenue and an extra 130 contracts – 90% of them in the education sector and across the Thames Valley region – and 500 new staff.
The in-house territory has subsequently grown which presents the opportunity for new franchised regions and further growth in 2020. Our central operations team has also expanded and we are in the process of structuring regions so that we are in a good position for resale moving forward. Our thanks and appreciation go to the team for their efforts in some challenging situations.
Our head office finance function has grown from team of four to six during 2019 and now includes a full-time Management Accountant, Financial Controller and Credit Controller. The finance team continues to look into alternative payroll solutions and is providing clear and useful reports that are supporting our operational efficiency and profitability.
Systems and compliance has performed strongly, successfully supporting Regional Directors in safeguarding staff and customers through RTW, DBS and onboarding, while ensuring compliance in audits is more accurately recorded, monitored and reported. UComply has now been successfully implemented and the Ezitracker project is making progress, after some initial development issues, and we are pleased to announce that we are entering early testing phases with the aim of rolling the new system out in 2020. The department has grown with the addition of two Systems Administrators and a Systems Analyst to help with the implementation of Netsuite, Ezitracker and improved reporting meaning more time can be spent on strategic insight and innovation for our franchisees.
Sales have had a strong year with £2.5 million worth of new contracts signed in the business from the Business Development Director, network and team. Having created an in-house bid writing team, our focus moving forward is on increasing our tender success rate as well as winning higher value and multi-site contracts. Our targets remain high for next year and healthy realistic pipelines have been developed across the business.
Our Brand continues to go from strength to strength with the acquisition and business wins. We had another active year on social media and within the trade, franchise and business press. We were also runner up at two award ceremonies and look forward to more entries and successes in 2020. We had a good overall year for inbound leads and looking ahead in marketing we have some exciting developments around personalisation and data. This will mean increased value and number of inbound leads resulting in another strong performance during 2020. Marketing is also planning to increase engagement with customers to update them with business news and relevant services.
We look forward to sharing our journey in 2020 with our customers and staff and I’d like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and Prosperous New Year.
