Retail/Leisure Business of the Year 2008

Business description: LOVEFiLM shook up the film rental market by introducing a home subscription service. Films are downloadable, DVDs can be sent first class to your home and returned free of charge. Operating in the UK, Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Germany, LOVEFiLM now has 500,000 active subscribers and a 25% share of the UK’s DVD rental market. Turnover should exceed £50m this year.

Judges’ comments: LOVEFiLM disruptive nature and meteoric growth was simply too impressive for the judges to overlook. Since forming just six years ago in 2002 it’s captured the online DVD rental market with frightening pace, harnessing a market that brought in revenues of around £65m in 2007. Determined to stay ahead of the game, LOVEFiLM has also invested heavily in the emerging digital downloads market and struck deals with a number of major film studios, as well as white label agreements with the likes of Tesco.

The pace of growth and drive for innovation has come at the expense of profit, but the judges felt the founders’ acceptance of risk in a bid to rapidly capture market share, was the essence of entrepreneurial zest that the awards aim to champion. Amazon’s decision to buy 30% of the company for a reported £70m suggested the judges weren’t alone in thinking LOVEFiLM has an extremely bright future.

www.lovefilm.com