It took Lucio and Meera Santoro 35 years to build up their London design company and just a week to watch it fall apart.
Production has stopped, staff have been suspended and support from the government’s more than half a trillion-dollar economic rescue package is slow to come through.
Britain has been in an effective lockdown for almost a month, with pubs and restaurants shut and most factories and shops closed, prompting official forecasters to warn of a 35% crash in April-June economic output and 10% unemployment. “The idea is that you retain as many jobs as possible when we switch back on,” Lucio Santoro said of his firm which designs, produces and licences its brands on goods such as stationery, bags and 3D pop up cards. “But the business has to survive until then.”
In comparison, Britain has got 7.6 billion pounds of loans to big businesses with investment-grade credit ratings, but many small firms with tiny profit margins are either still waiting or avoiding loans they know they can’t pay back. Santoro Group has, until now, been one of the successes. On Tuesday, it was awarded Britain’s most prestigious industry accolade: The Queen’s Award for Enterprise for International Trade. It is the second time Santoro has won.
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