INDUSTRY
S T R AT E G Y I N T E R V I E W
Office products sector: Aidan McDonough tells all Integra Business Solutions’ CEO AIDAN MCDONOUGH discusses the issues facing the sector, why five-year plans are useless, and predicts a slew of M&A activity in the next year
W
ith 27 years in the office products
- that’s where there was most closure - but the recovery
sector, latterly as CEO of Integra
was pretty quick, in fairness; the guys got on board with
Business Solutions, Aidan
the COVID-secure products, and it was looking ok.”
McDonough is an experienced head who knows that the sector will always
Despite this, Aidan reckons the second lockdown was harder than the first. “First time you have the
evolve and overcome whatever problems are thrown at
adrenaline; you are making quick decisions and you are
it – such as a global pandemic and its aftermath.
not sure what is going on,” he explains. “The second
“The first lockdown, in mid-March, was a huge shock; nobody had anticipated anything like it,” he says. “We had three months of closure. You are sitting
one was just tortuous. I don’t know if it was the weather, or the consistency of it.” Nevertheless, Integra fared well through the
there doing financial projections; the furlough scheme
pandemic, and has focused on several key areas during
was coming in and nobody was sure of the detail, and
that time - including diversifying the product mix,
you think ‘This is catastrophic! This will be the end as
something the company has been working on for about
we’ll all run out of money.’
two and a half years.
“Integra is intrinsically linked to its members. If they
“We brought in medical supplies, which was in no way
are doing badly, we are doing badly - that’s how the
related to COVID, it was about the fact could we get into
model works. The second quarter of 2020 was really tough
care homes, dentists and GP surgeries,” he says.
[10] SUMMER 2021
www.dealersupport.co.uk
