Business Awards: Tim Toft Violins

IT MAY only be a small shop front, but inside, Tim Toft Violins is a Tardis – opening up a window on the world.

And the world is a booming market for the stringed orchestral instrument restoration and specialist dealer company – one in which it has boosted both its home and overseas trade by more than 20 per cent during the past year, despite the onset of recession.

Mr Toft, who started the £1 million per year business 18 years ago, said: "People see our little shop windows in Stone but rarely realise that we are a global operator.

"When one market is quiet there is usually business to be done elsewhere in the world."

As an example of that, when the weak U.S. dollar made imports unattractive to Americans early in the year, the company made a big push in Japan, growing its business there by 75 per cent to around a third of its overall sales.

Now Tim Toft Violins is a nominee for The Sentinel's UK Trade & Investment-sponsored international trade award and the Business Initiative-backed small business of the year award.

The UK market hasn't been too bad either, providing the firm's proprietor with the opportunity to indulge in two things he is really passionate about – stringed instruments and Stoke City.

Combining business with the pleasure of supporting the club, he has launched into corporate hospitality, taking customers to matches and forming a string quartet – two violins, a viola and a cello – with the instruments painted in Stoke's red and white colours.

They performed a specially commissioned arrangement of the club anthem, Delilah, at the Stone Music Festival, attended by TV personality and City fan Nick Hancock.

Away from football Mr Toft fulfilled one of his many ambitions by organising a showpiece concert, featuring Japanese virtuoso violinist Atsuko Sahara and the North Staffordshire Symphony Orchestra performing Beethoven's Violin Concerto to a capacity audience in Stone's Christ Church. He said: "That was brilliant. It's a very showy piece for the soloist and she received a five-minute standing ovation."

Employing five people full-time, three part-time and four outworkers, the company is based on its founder's vast knowledge of identifying, dating and sourcing stringed instruments, and has earned a global reputation for its expertise.

A consultant to a specialist London auction house, the company offers certification and valuation for higher price instruments.

Its customers range from beginners buying or renting affordable starter instruments – often through its www.timtoftviolins.com online shop – to soloists spending six-figure sums on antiques sympathetically restored by its specialist craftspeople.

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