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SEPTEMBER
SPENDING TIME
The CEO of bottled water company Highland Spring talks about his career so far and the
brand’s new partnership with Flybe
BUSINESS
5 minutes with...
LES MONTGOMERY
How long have you been with Highland
Spring?
I started in 1985, so it’s been 31 years now. I
joined from a small private accounting practice
in Stirling, where I’d worked for about five
years after leaving school. I also went back to
study full time for two years during that time,
and I realised pretty quickly I didn’t want to
be an auditor. I didn’t just want to work in an
accounts office, I knew that I wanted to do
something else, and I had the opportunity to
make a break from the accounts office to go
and work in this bottled water company. In
1985, bottled water wasn’t necessarily talked
about, certainly not something that people
in Scotland probably gave any thought to
whatsoever, other than when you went to Spain
on your holidays. I thoroughly enjoyed the
change when I went to work in this fast-moving
environment – the growth in bottled water at
that time was just phenomenal.
How long had Highland Spring been going
at that point?
The business had been going for five years, and
it had been losing money in that time. At that
time, the only true bottled water in the UK
was Perrier, a sparkling water in nice, trendy
green bottles, which gave rise to a few other
manufacturers building factories – Highland
Spring being among them. The owners of
Highland Spring built a bottled water factory
and over the course of those five years, had
product bottled, and created demand with the
retailers, who were looking for new categories
to sell. I joined in 1985, which was the last
year the business lost money. For the past 31
years, we’ve been a profitable business, and
our business and the bottled water market has
grown 30 times in that period.
What was the progression from your
starting role to CEO?
I was training to be an accountant when I
joined, and I completed my training when
I was at Highland Spring. As the business
grew, I moved through the office, and in
1993, I became finance director. The chief
executive wasn’t based in the head office, he
was in Devon, so over the course of the next
15 years, as well as being finance director, I
was effectively the deputy – I was the most
senior guy on site, so I got an opportunity to be
involved in every aspect of the business during
that 15 years, which kept me interested.
In 2007, I took over as interim chief
executive, and in 2008 I became permanent
chief executive. When I took over, I was
conscious that the business had reached a
certain level, and we’d probably sat at that
level for the last few years.
In 2008, I set out with a vision to change the
business, to double the business from a £50m
turnover to a £100m turnover, to become
the biggest in the UK, the number one brand.
We immediately went on an acquisition trail
as well, we made three acquisitions of other
bottled water businesses over the course of
the next two years. So we grew a bit through
acquisition and we grew organically, as well.
We’ve now achieved all of those targets, and
we’re close to selling 500 million litres of
water a year, which was another big one.
WhatÕ
s next, then?
The soft drinks category in the UK is worth
about 15 billion litres of product, and bottled
water is about 2.5 billion of that, so for every
one bottle of water sold, there’s five bottles
of other soft drink being sold. We expected
to be a bigger player in that broader soft
drinks category by now, however, the growth
in bottled water has been so strong, that we’re
making sure we’re maintaining our position
in the bottled water market first. But the plan
is to enter the market with other products,
flavoured water and drinks at the healthier end
of the spectrum, and we will get to that, but
we’re trying to match our growth to the growth
of the bottled water market, to keep up. This
year we’re spending £20m on an extension to
our factory, two new bottling lines… There’s
lots of investment going on because I don’t see
the market slowing down.
What makes you get up for work every day?
I like working for a brand that people know, a
brand that’s true and that’s good for you, it’s
a brand that people want. There’s 500 people
in the business now, and I think I’m the sixth
longest-serving member of staff, so there’s
the opportunity to interact with a lot of them,
and in my job I get to meet a lot of interesting
people outside of business as well.
Highland Spring is now sold on Flybe
planes. How important is that partnership?
We’ve been great supporters of getting water
on planes, so it’s a great thing for us. It’s really
important to hydrate while you’re travelling,
and it means Highland Spring is going all over
Europe, which is great for our brand visibility.
www.highlandspringgroup.com