儿童服装公司(1/4)

Good morning, nice to meet you. Do sit down.

Thank you.

Now, you're Human Resources manager of Jenkins, aren't you?

Give me some background on the company, so I get a general picture.

Stephen Jenkins founded the company nearly 30 years ago, and named it after himself, and he ran it for along time.

Last year one of our competitors proposed combining, with the idea that separately the two companies were too small to survive.

They were probably right, but anyway Stephen turned down the offer.

Then, because he was getting on, he handed over the day-to-day running to his daughter, Catherine, while retaining full control himself.

And you make children's clothes, don't you? Aren't there problems in the sector?

Well, we mostly sell to retail chains, which sell them under their own brand labels.

And things aren't as easy as they were, what with cheap imports, and the more expensive children's boutiques making inroads at the top end of the market.

But we position ourselves in the middle range, so we're not too badly affected.

We're under increasing pressure to cut our profit margins, though, because of growing competition between High Street retailers.