Car competition company Best of the Best sees revenues nearly treble

Shares in online car competition firm Best of the Best (BOTB) have skyrocketed 38 per cent today after it revealed its sales nearly trebled, and profits grew more than fivefold despite cutting ticket prices for its car competitions.

Revenues in the six months to October 31 soared from £7.6million to £22.09million compared to the same time last year while its pre-tax profits climbed from £1.38million to £6.8million.

The West London-based group said the results were proof its move to a wholly-online format was working well. It completed the transition in July 2019 two decades after founder William Hindmarch opened its first site at Heathrow Airport.

On the Best of the Best website, consumers can bid a very small amount of money to win cars from brands like Tesla Model 3, which normally cost tens of thousands of pounds

This has significantly lowered costs because it no longer hires physical spaces, which totalled 26 at their highest point and included all the major British airports like Gatwick and Manchester, and shopping centre such as Westfield London.

BOTB continues to possess no borrowings, and its cash balance has more than doubled to £11.2million from £5.2million in April 2020, which itself was £3.3million higher than in April 2019.

Last year, it added a new ‘Midweek Car Competition’ where consumers can bid at prices lower than £2 to win vehicles costing in the low tens of thousands from brands including Tesla, Mercedes and Ford.

Entry prices of its Weekly Lifestyle and Dream Car competitions have also been made cheaper, and BOTB has stated that both competitions ‘delivered encouraging results.’ In addition, winners of the latter contest can take home £50,000 in cash.

Its Weekly Lifetsyle competitions do host cash competitions, alongside prizes for luxury watches, motorbikes, holidays and technological goods like televisions, camera equipment and Xbox consoles.

‘The first half of the year has delivered encouraging sales and profits growth,’ remarked William Hindmarch, ‘and importantly, we also completed the transition to an online-only business which has driven a step change in growth.’

BOTB used to operate car competitions in airports across Britain. Company founder William Hindmarch opened its first physical site at Heathrow Airport in 1999

Hindmarch, whose sister is fashion accessories designer Anya Hindmarch, said sales have continued to be impressive since then, and the firm is now expecting its full-year pre-tax profits to be higher than expectations.

Because of the strong results, BOTB investors will receive a special dividend of £3.75million between them on February 5. Shares in the firm are now 570 per cent higher than at the same time last year.

More investment has been put into its IT systems and attracting new customers, and its Facebook and Instagram followers now total 366,000 and almost 250,000, respectively.

Hindmarch added: ‘Whilst growing our investment in new customer acquisition, alongside improving the products and experience we offer existing players, BOTB has invested in increasing the range of competitions and prizes.

‘I am pleased with the growth delivered in the year to date and how well-positioned the business is for the future.’

This post first appeared on Dailymail.co.uk