Toft on the rise

Kerry and Doug Lord knew that their business was ready to expand.

Since its formation in 1997, Dunchurch-based Toft Alpacas had become well-established and highly-respected as a supplier of DIY knitwear to customers locally, across Europe and in the United States.

The Toft stud, with its high-pedigree alpacas, welcomes visitors from far and wide throughout the year. A thriving retail side of the business, meanwhile, was ready to take the next step: to expand into selling to other retailers.

The potential was clearly there.

And following a Micro Enterprise Grant from the Warwickshire Rural Growth Network, that potential is now being fully exploited. The grant was accessed from the Rural Development Programme for England, a seven-year programme (2007–2013) funded jointly by the EU, through the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) and the UK Government.

Assisted by a £23,000 grant, Toft Alpacas was able to upscale to meet the demand which any small business craves but inevitably must expand in order to satisfy.  The grant increased the level of production of  the Alpaca yarn and mixed yarns to expand the wholesale side of the business

"The grant made a huge difference," said Kerry. "We needed to expand and would probably have been able to do so eventually, but it would have taken years.

"Our grant was not a huge amount of money but, for a small business, made an enormous difference. It just allowed us to grow the business in areas where it really needed to grow, like batch-sizes and storage space, website functionality and design software - and we took on more staff.

"The grant enabled us to make that leap and, as a result, our orders have grown too. We now have more than 50 stockists in this country, throughout Europe and the USA.

"Without the grant, the expansion we needed would not have been possible for some years."

Find out more about similar grant funding available to small rural businesses in Warwickshire by clicking here