Minoli continue to look to grow as confidence increases for 2013

Based at their Oxfordshire headquarters, businessman Jonathon Minoli (44) is Managing Director of leading tile supplier Minoli . With a rapidly increasing portfolio of clients across London and the South East of England, Jonathon Minoli has continued to drive the business forward into new markets in order to capitalise on changing trends in the economy, interior design and property markets.

When founded in central London in the 1940s by Jonathon’s late grandfather Luigi, the company initially both produced and installed Terrazzo, before relocating to Oxford and branching out into the supply of Italian ceramic tiles in the 1960’s. Since the decision to change the direction of the business over 50 years ago, Minoli has continued to supply floor, wall and mosaic tiles to a wide range of clients, and has remained a market leader in delivering products that meet the needs of their different customer groups.

Although a family business, Jonathon took the decision to take full control of Minoli as the majority shareholder in 2007. That same week, the devastating impact of Northern Rock’s financial difficulties rippled across the City and within the year, the collapse of investment bank, Lehman Brothers had sparked a global recession – triggering economic instability in the UK marketplace.

To survive and grow, many businesses across the country were forced to reassess their strategies and diversify. Minoli’s business was structured around servicing three core sectors; house builders and developers, corporate clients (such as automotive and retail) and wholesale to mostly independent retailers. Recognising their changing needs, Minoli set about restructuring and strengthening their offer around sourcing the best products, holding plentiful stock and providing the highest levels of service.

Jonathon comments, “Although these were economically uncertain times, and particularly difficult for suppliers such as my company – my team and I were required to think ‘outside of the box’ and look at new ways to retain and grow the business in markets that still showed promise.

“Because our business model is based on supplying all of our core ranges from stock, we found ourselves picking up business where our competitors were unable to meet the delivery lead times. Our long-standing relationships with some of best manufacturers in the world also proved a great advantage as we’re often first to market with new styles and formats, many of which are exclusive to Minoli.”

Focusing on these areas of opportunity, throughout the last two years, Minoli have invested significantly in their delivery fleet and expanded their stockholding to offer a reliability of supply and level of service that’s generally considered second to none.

The UK recession also had a significant impact on the real estate industry and notably, the scale of new developments outside of London decreased – impacting suppliers and contractors alike.

“We could see what was happening to developments outside of the Capital and knew we had to adapt and focus our business development efforts even more on London’s real estate sector which was attracting considerable international investment and interest.

“With a dedicated team and increased delivery capacity, our customer base in London has grown significantly, as has awareness of our company with top-flight residential and commercial developers.”

Located in Oxford, Minoli’s distribution centre is ideally located to service London and the South-east with direct access to the UK’s major motorway routes. The warehouse provides over 22,000 sq ft of storage, representing some £1.6m in net cost stock value.

Minoli continues to run as a family company with Jonathon Minoli as the Managing Director, assisted by a team of experienced and professional people, many of whom have been with the company for many years and bring knowledge and stability to the company and its clients.