Brands hatched

It is never long before Andrew Actman, owner of the eponymous eyewear company and deputy chairman of the Federation of Manufacturing Opticians, turns the conversation to cars. Andrew Actman Eyewear's Wimbledon headquarters doubles up as a garage for his MG Midget, Austin Healey and his Daihatsu rally car, which he regularly races in various events at home and abroad. But when he's not behind the wheel, he's busy running one of the UK's most successful frame companies, one which has a selection of impressive licensing agreements with characteristically British brand names such as Karen Millen, Lotus and Oasis. Actman developed his understanding of the optics industry when he was managing the London-based David Clulow group in the early 1980s. While there, he used the group's NHS rebate to purchase Burdett Optical, a well-known producer of acetate frames in the East End where Actman learnt all about frame making. Upon leaving Clulow, he decided to go it alone in the frame business. 'We started in 1986 with 10 frames from a guy in LA who had faith in me,' explains Actman. 'I took on a rep and we took five frames each Ð I went north and she went south. We met up a couple of days later and we hadn't sold anything.' Actman and his rep refined their sales skills and two years later Andrew Actman Eyewear was becoming a reputable distributor, establishing a good name for itself both within UK optics and with the factories it had been trading with worldwide. With this new-found clout in the frames business Actman decided it was time to look at the bigger picture. 'There had to be something done to make sure I could sell frames that were better value for money,' he explains. 'The problem was that we had this supply chain where there was the factory making it, they sold it to some guy who held a licence, who then sold it to me and gave me the UK licence, and then I sold it to the optician and then off it went to the public Ð it doesn't work. 'There are still a number of companies doing it but they're struggling and they will struggle because there's just not enough margin in it. The supply chain is too long, way too long.' Still not well enough known to approach anybody for a brand licence, Actman decided to start his own. The Andrew Actman line began in 1989 and it was then that Actman began designing frames. By this time Burdett had succumbed to the pressures of manufacturing economics Ð labour and rent meant that Far East factories became more competitive. Actman says his time there was a great grounding: 'I knew what a frame was all about.' 'The Andrew Actman line sort of forced me into designing frames, I had no option. I wanted to stop this supply chain so what could I do? I could go along to a manufacturer in France, Germany, Italy or the Far East and buy some frames, stick a name on it and go and sell it Ð and a lot of people do that Ð but it doesn't work because you end up with a hotchpotch of bits and pieces. It doesn't look like a collection.' One of the first things the Andrew Actman line did was to signature everything. Nosepads, end tips, printing techniques all conformed to the collection's aims. Bit by bit, design became less of a process of adapting components to fit with an idea and more one where Actman would bring ideas to the table, ideas which the factories, keen to continue their rewarding relationship with the young UK company, were pleased to bring to fruition. The Actman brand grew and grew. To this day, each model uses names borrowed from the world of motor sport. Some relatively obvious such as Hot Hatch, others more obscure like Dingle Dell, a corner at Brands Hatch.