West Yorkshire stairlift firm achieves record turnover of £149.2m

West Yorkshire’s Acorn Stairlifts has reported a record turnover of £149.2m and a record profit after tax of £13.4m.

The Steeton-based firm’s financial statement for the year ended September 30th, 2015, also show that international sales are up by almost £12.8m on the previous year.

In the USA, Acorn’s sales now outstrip the UK home market, while the company continues to expand in Europe regardless of June’s ‘Brexit’ vote.

Acorn’s latest figures show that in mainland Europe, turnover is up by 37.5% to £20.5m.

In addition, Acorn also recently opened a new office in France to grow direct sales to consumers and manage installation and aftercare.

Established in 1992, Acorn is now the world’s largest company dedicated solely to the manufacture, sale, installation and servicing of stairlifts.

Acorn’s continued growth has been spearheaded by several of its industry inventions, including its patented FastTrack system for curved stairlifts. FastTrack means that even stairlifts for non-standard curved staircases can be installed in a customer’s home within just a few days of an initial inquiry.

Acorn now manufactures more than 60,000 stairlifts per year at its West Yorkshire factories in Steeton and Shipley, and its sister company in Haddington, near Edinburgh.

The factories are exported to 84 countries, sold direct to consumers through Acorn’s wholly-owned subsidiaries in Ireland, Belgium, Italy, France, Germany, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the USA, as well as through third-party distributors in these and other countries. .

Dave Belmont, Acorn company secretary, said: “Exports from our UK factories are now a major part of our business, accounting for two-thirds of our total sales.

“Over the past five years we have invested around £8m in our factories and recruited continually to keep pace with our growth and demand for our industry-leading stairlifts. We now employ around 1,400 people worldwide, more than 500 of those here in West Yorkshire.”

“There are still lots of people who need stairlifts and we want to keep on growing.

“We have a long-term vision and are prepared to invest in the business for long-term growth. Our mission is to become the world’s best stairlift provider and these latest figures show we are well on track to achieving that goal.”

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