Family-owned Manchester business Cosatto has secured its first export to Australia in 15 years, shipping £130,000 of its bespoke baby products with the financial support of UK Export Finance (UKEF). The UK and Australia are important economic partners. A new free trade agreement between the two countries would be worth billions of pounds to the UK economy and is close to being signed.
Cosatto already sells to retailers large and small in the UK, and sales to distributors in countries like Japan account for 15% of its growing export business. However, when it came to arranging the insurance for a major deal with a distributor in Melbourne, their insurance broker would not cover the risk if the deal fell through. At risk of losing the contract, Cosatto turned to UKEF, the UK’s export credit agency, which was able to step in with its export credit insurance scheme. This enabled the business to export 300 prams, 750 strollers and 200 highchairs to another family-owned business.
