The cross country race

The successful Var in the UK doesn't have to be limited to theseshores. Guy Clapperton takes a look at the possibilities and pitfalls ofventuring into markets outside Great Britain.

A great many Vars do very well selling into their niche and end up as dominant players in the UK market. They know the products to sell and they know who to talk to about upgrades and incremental business alike.

They do very well, thank you, selling to the niche they have selected and the profits will roll in for a fair time as long as the business plan is right.

But eventually they will find that they are limiting their growth by playing only in one geographical area. Britain, though sometimes referred to as Great, is actually not all that big, and playing for a minority niche in an already small market is not the key to magnificent growth of sales for anyone who wants to build a substantial business. Agreed, a number of people are perfectly happy with slightly limited growth and want to continue small but profitable. This is entirely fair as long as there is no question of wanting to change a business later, but there do appear to be opportunities for those wanting to expand. Often it is just a matter of knowing how to go about it.

The first task is to select a market to sell to. This sounds disarmingly easy but is in fact no such thing, and anybody unsure of what their ideal target market is should waste no time in consulting with the DTI's Business Link scheme (see box).

Obviously the cost of linguistic translation needs to be taken into account as does the culture of the market being addressed, and the translation is not as simple as it sounds. Rob Wirszycz, director general of the CSSA, says the size of this sort of undertaking ought not to be underestimated.