Communisis upbeat as company continues to reduce its net debt

The company, which has major operations in Leeds, said total revenue was up 6 per cent in the six months to June 30, 2017.

Revenue rose from £174.9m in the same period last year to £186m this year. Pre-tax profit rose from £4.4m to £5m this year.

Andy Blundell, chief executive of Communisis, told The Yorkshire Post that trading was “strong” in the first six months. He added that he was pleased with “good free cash generation contributing to debt reduction”.

The company also said it resolved structural issues such as bank refinancing and pension deficit. “Which gives us in both cases certainty for the medium term, i.e the next three to five years,” Mr Blundell said.

Mark Stoner, finance director at Communisis, said: “The revenue increase has been driven by our international growth, so 30 per cent of our revenue is now outside these shores and that’s within our brand deployment business.”

Communisis recently won a five-year marketing communications contract with HSBC.

Mr Blundell added: “That will benefit our Leeds operation and Leeds generally, this is the direct mail marketing plant at Cross Gates, and is performing very strongly.

“It has had a couple of filips this year, partly from work around the election and also through some work we’ve been doing on personalised examination papers for schools.”

Andrew Bryant, analyst at Liberum, said first half results at Communisis showed “good progress”.