LFH Brand Identity secures major investment from The Capital Fund

Print and design management agency LFH Brand Identity has secured 250,000 in new investment from The Capital Fund, a 50 million venture capital fund that invests in fast growth companies in Greater London. 

LFH offers a one-stop shop facility from the creation of stunning design concepts right through to the production of artwork for finished packaging for its big name consumer brand clients. The new funding will be used to consolidate relationships with existing clients and to seek out new businesses ready to take advantage of the company’s innovative cost-saving techniques.

Set up in 1993, LFH provides a unique end-to-end service that means their clients – including the likes of Coca-Cola and Unilever – can be confident that the design ideas they see developed can be delivered in final consumer products.  LFH has had crucial impact in many successful product campaigns and launches, ranging from well-known domestic brands in the home and personal care sectors to leading food and healthcare products.

Led by joint managing directors Graham Hawkins and Mano Manoharan LFH has over 50 employees based in London, Brussels and Melbourne, and an annual turnover of around €6 million.

Mano Manoharan said: ‘We wanted to develop a design agency that also had a credible production offering. We were finding that all too often designers were coming up with whizzy ideas, getting clients excited, that turned out to be completely impractical and undeliverable when it came to producing the final carton or bottle.  This is a complete waste of everyone’s time and money.’

The company has been developed with a close synergy between its production and design arms, providing customers with a complete package, concentrating on improving design and production standards at the same time as providing real cost reductions.  Manoharan said: ‘We like to make sure there are no surprises for our clients. If you have separate design and production facilities, it is amazing how rapidly cost overruns can occur. We make sure that doesn’t happen.’

One of LFH’s recent innovations has been ‘Project Rainbow’. The team identified that one of the main causes of high production costs was that companies tended to use a palette of many different colors across their product range. This means that there is a great deal of wasted expense – such as, shorter, less-efficient print runs, more printing cylinders, and extra cleaning and set-up time for presses required when printing labeling and packaging.  Manoharan said: ‘For Unilever Foods we were able to rationalize their colors from over one hundred down to just six. This alone is saving three million euros on production of just a single product category each year.’

This color harmonization and rationalization process is something that LFH is keen to roll out for other clients. The benefits are clear, the LFH team believes, and there are many companies that could also make enormous savings. And, importantly, these savings can be made while maintaining the highest design and production standards.

Manoharan said: ‘The key for us is to convince the marketeers at our clients that standards will be maintained while big cost savings can be made. This is where having a credible design capability that we can deliver right through to product is crucial.’

As part of The Capital Fund’s investment process David Cardwell was appointed to LFH’s Board as a non-executive director. Cardwell is vastly experienced in the media and marketing sectors, not least from 25 years as co-founder and chief executive of Copyright Promotions, the first independent entertainment rights licensing company in the UK. He currently sits on the board of a number of innovative companies as a non-exec director or chairman.

Manoharan said: ‘We are delighted to be working with David, whose reputation of working with companies like us precedes him. He has vast experience of maximizing the potential of a company with a unique selling point – and we are very excited to have him as part of the team. Ian Cameron at The Capital Fund has also been a source of excellent advice, and we’re looking forward to continuing to work with him as we develop and grow the business.’

Ian Cameron, investment director at The Capital Fund, commented: ‘We were very pleased to be able to invest in LFH – it is clearly a company with a solid base and great growth potential. We always look for excellence in company management before committing funds, and Mano and Graham provide just that. We are also delighted that David Cardwell has been appointed as a non-executive director. He has the right sort of experience to complement the current management skills.’