Upholstery2U
Founders:
Michael Boyle & Daniel Boyle
Established:
2021
Investment:
2024
Middleton invested £1.125m
BACKGROUND
Upholstery2U was founded in Burnley by brothers Danny & Michael. The company provides B2B mobile upholstery, repairing soft surfaces such as gym equipment padding, furniture in hospitality venues and medical beds in hospitals and dentists. The company is set apart from competition as they repair on-site in their custom made vans. This brings the time to repair down dramatically and a service at a fraction of the price while reducing wastage by repairing items, instead of replacing and prolonging a furnishing’s lifetime. This drive is predominantly driven by negating the need to ship products back to suppliers (often overseas) for repairs and instead carry out repairs in a car park.
The company has contracts with gym equipment suppliers such as Matrix as well as directly with large chains like JD Gyms, Holiday Inn & David Lloyd.
Danny was trained as an upholsterer, working for his fathers business for 15 years with a deep understanding of the industry and running the operational side of the business while Michael is a second time founder, having previously run a successful baby scanning business and runs the sales side of the business.
Why we invested in Upholstery2U?
The founders spotted a need for change in a poorly served market. The upholstery market was broken, with slow response times and poor customer service. Upholstery2U fixed the problem with a mobile solution, which they have proven works after multiple bluechip contracts. They have a proven blueprint to scale and a plan to disrupt the upholstery market. A stronger product with high margins, long term, sticky contracts and a team to scale made the investment an attractive proposition. They have dominated the niche of gym equipment repairs over a very short period, experiencing high-growth and no signs of slowing down and have identified obvious new verticals to penetrate.
Moving Forward…
The team sought out Middleton Enterprises Growth Capital due to the similarities between the HomeServe journey and their own and we look forward to supporting them as they grow across Europe and internationally, just as HomeServe did.
Our goal is to build Upholstery2U into the biggest brand in upholstery solutions, moving deeper into new verticals and continuing to dominate existing areas across the UK and internationally.