The people behind the numbers
For Carter , Growth Street is about people as well as product , “ We ’ re a modern business and we believe in using technology to make our customers ’ lives as simple as possible , but we don ’ t take the attitude that we should replace humans in the customer process ,” Carter says . “ One thing that frustrates businesses about most lenders is that they don ’ t take the time to understand the business in detail . Every business is unique , they all have particular aspects of their business model or their growth plans that a lender really needs to understand and that can only be done through personal interaction .”
So , building and maintaining personal relationships are very much at the heart of the business ? “ Yes ,” Carter answers emphatically . “ It ’ s very different to how many modern lenders approach things because machines tend to take over everything and there ’ s a real lack of human interaction . SMEs in the UK account for around 5.5mn businesses and what we ’ re trying to do is focus on the 130,000 that are the most impactful and actually have a unique set of needs . It ’ s only possible to serve those businesses with people .”
Looking ahead
As our conversation draws to a close Carter has a message for businesses in the manufacturing industry , “ We live in a news environment where there ’ s a lot of pessimism about the UK economy and manufacturing . I really believe the consensus is a lot more pessimistic than the reality , particularly when you look at the manufacturing industry . Manufacturing is not only surviving – it ’ s thriving .
“ The cheaper pound has spurred a big surge in orders . We ’ ve seen increase in labour demand across the sector . Manufacturing in Q2 has the largest growth in vacancies of any industry in the UK . There ’ s a huge amount of opportunity for manufacturing businesses at the moment to take advantage of some of the current economic conditions . We ’ re real believers in the manufacturing industry at Growth Street . We ’ re really keen to encourage businesses to approach us if they need support for growth .”
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