About Us
About Clear Prospects Ltd
British Manufacturing, Built Over More Than 25 Years
Clear Prospects Ltd is a UK-based manufacturing and online retail company, founded by Michael Robinson in 1999.
What started with the development and launch of The JetRest® travel pillow has grown over almost 3 decades into a specialist textile manufacturing business with its own factory in Blackburn, Lancashire, together with a collection of specialist consumer and trade brands.
At the heart of Clear Prospects is a simple principle:
We like making things.
We design, develop, print, cut, sew, finish, personalise and supply a wide range of products from our own UK manufacturing operation, while also using carefully established UK and overseas suppliers where manufacturing or sourcing elsewhere makes commercial sense.
This combination of UK manufacturing, product development, digital printing and specialist sourcing enables us to operate both directly with individual consumers and as a trade supplier.
From One Travel Pillow to a Family of Brands
The Clear Prospects story began with The JetRest® Travel Pillow.
Michael Robinson developed the product following his own experiences travelling around the world and the frustration of trying to sleep comfortably while travelling. The JetRest® became the company's first major product and the starting point for the manufacturing business.
From those beginnings, Clear Prospects developed its own textile manufacturing capabilities in Blackburn and began producing a much wider range of fabric-based products.
Over the years, we have created specialist brands around different areas of our manufacturing expertise.
Our Consumer Brands
The JetRest®
Our original brand and the product that started the company. Today The JetRest® offers travel pillows, personalised luggage straps, eye masks and other travel accessories, with many products manufactured in the UK.
WheatyBags®
Created in 2010, WheatyBags® is our specialist range of microwave heat packs and warming products. The range is manufactured in the UK and has been tested against the voluntary UK safety standard BS 8433. The brand has grown from its original wheat bags into a broad range of heat packs in different shapes, sizes, fabrics and configurations.
HappySnapGifts®
Our personalised photo gift business, bringing our textile printing and manufacturing expertise directly to individual consumers. Photo Cushions, Face Cushions, Photo Bunting, personalised textiles and many other photo gifts are made to order, alongside products produced using our in-house card printing and mug and bottle pressing capabilities.
Our Trade Brand
BMPM® — British Made Promotional Merchandise
Our specialist trade operation supplying promotional merchandise to businesses, agencies and promotional merchandise distributors.
BMPM® combines our UK textile manufacturing and full-colour dye sublimation expertise with a much wider promotional merchandise sourcing service.
Many of our British-made promotional products can be manufactured from just one item, with no minimum order quantity — allowing businesses to order anything from a single branded sample through to much larger production runs.
[Visit BMPM®]
Our Manufacturing Expertise
Although our brands have different customers and different products, they share the same manufacturing foundations.
Our Blackburn operation has developed considerable expertise in textile product manufacture over many years.
Our capabilities include:
- Full-colour dye sublimation printing
- Digital fabric printing
- Fabric cutting
- Textile sewing and construction
- Product filling
- Heat pressing
- Mug and bottle pressing
- Product finishing
- Personalisation
- Quality control
- Packaging and despatch
This means that we can do much more than simply buy an existing product and add a logo or photograph to it.
We can manufacture products from the beginning — working with fabrics, printed designs, patterns, fillings and finished components to create products that meet a particular requirement.
That manufacturing capability is particularly valuable when developing products that don't exist as standard catalogue items.
Printing Is a Major Part of What We Do
Our investment in full-colour digital printing and dye sublimation has become an important part of the business.
Dye sublimation allows us to reproduce detailed artwork, photographs, logos and full-colour designs across textiles before those fabrics are turned into finished products.
This capability is central to HappySnapGifts®, where customers' own photographs can become cushions, bunting and other personalised textile products.
It is also central to BMPM®, where clients' brands can be incorporated into cushions, headrest covers, tablecloths, sashes, bags and many other promotional products.
The same manufacturing capability can therefore serve both an individual customer wanting a single personalised gift and a business wanting branded merchandise.
We Make Products for People and Businesses
Clear Prospects operates across both direct-to-consumer (D2C) and business-to-business (B2B) markets.
Our consumer websites allow individuals to buy our own products and personalised gifts directly from us.
Our trade operation allows businesses and promotional merchandise professionals to access our UK manufacturing capabilities and wider sourcing network.
This combination gives us an interesting perspective on product development.
We see what individual consumers want.
We understand what businesses need.
And because we manufacture many of the products ourselves, we can turn those requirements into physical products rather than simply sourcing something from a catalogue.
UK Manufacturing and Global Sourcing
We are proud of our UK manufacturing operation and manufacture the majority of the products across our specialist ranges here in Britain.
However, we also recognise that UK manufacturing isn't always the appropriate solution for every product, specification or quantity.
Clear Prospects has therefore developed long-standing relationships with suppliers in the UK, Europe and the Far East.
This gives us the ability to combine British manufacturing with international sourcing where appropriate.
For our customers, that can mean access to products that are made in Britain where we specialise in manufacturing them, while also giving us the flexibility to source products that are better suited to external manufacture.
We are transparent about that distinction.
If we manufacture it in Britain, we are proud to say so.
Product Development Is in Our DNA
Clear Prospects has always been a product-led business.
The company didn't begin by buying a range of products from a catalogue. It began because Michael Robinson identified a problem with existing travel pillows and developed The JetRest® as his own solution.
That approach has continued throughout the company's history.
WheatyBags® was developed as our own range of microwave heat packs.
HappySnapGifts® grew from our ability to print photographs onto textiles and turn them into finished products.
BMPM® developed from our expertise in textile printing and manufacturing and the opportunity to provide those capabilities to the promotional merchandise industry.
Many of the products we make today have evolved through customer requests, feedback and ideas from within the business.
We are always interested in the next product we can make.
A Business Built Around Manufacturing
One of the things that links all our brands is that there is a real manufacturing operation behind them.
We aren't simply a collection of online shops.
Behind the websites are people, machinery, fabrics, printing equipment, sewing machines, production processes and decades of accumulated knowledge about making textile products.
That gives us the ability to respond to customers in ways that a conventional online retailer cannot always do.
Sometimes that means manufacturing a single personalised gift.
Sometimes it means producing thousands of branded promotional products.
Sometimes it means developing an entirely new product.
And sometimes it means sourcing a product from an established supplier because that is the right solution.
Michael Robinson — Founder
Clear Prospects Ltd was founded by Michael Robinson in 1999.
Michael has more than 30 years of experience in the manufacture and supply of promotional and textile products in the UK and remains closely involved in the development of the business.
His original product development work on The JetRest® established the foundations for the company, while his continuing interest in product development, manufacturing and online retail has helped shape the business into what it is today.
The company has evolved considerably since those early days, but the original philosophy remains:
Find a useful product. Make it well. Listen to customers. And keep looking for better ways to manufacture it.
[Connect with Michael Robinson on LinkedIn]
Our Four Specialist Websites
Each of our websites has its own customers, products and personality, but all are connected by the same UK manufacturing business.
The JetRest®
Travel Accessories Made in the UK
The product that started it all — from the original JetRest® Travel Pillow to personalised luggage straps and other travel accessories.
Visit The JetRest® →
WheatyBags®
Premium Quality Heat Packs Made in Britain
Our specialist range of microwave heat packs, wheat bags and warming products, developed and manufactured in Lancashire.
Visit WheatyBags® →
HappySnapGifts®
Personalised Photo Gifts Made in Britain
Our consumer photo gift business, turning customers' photographs into cushions, face cushions, masks, bunting, mugs, bottles, posters and many other personalised products.
Visit HappySnapGifts® →
BMPM®
British Made Promotional Merchandise
Our specialist trade operation manufacturing branded promotional products using our textile printing and manufacturing expertise, with many products available from just one item.
Visit BMPM® →
Made in Lancashire. Sold Across the UK and Beyond.
Our Blackburn factory may be at the heart of Clear Prospects, but our customers are everywhere.
Our products are sold directly to consumers throughout the UK and internationally, while our trade customers use our manufacturing and sourcing services for their own businesses, brands, events and promotional campaigns.
Technology has changed enormously since we started in 1999.
Manufacturing has changed.
Printing has changed.
The way customers shop has changed.
But our commitment to developing products and manufacturing them properly remains.
What's Next?
After almost 3 decades in business, we are still developing new products, investing in manufacturing and looking for new ways to use the capabilities we have built.
Some ideas become products.
Some become new brands.
Some become completely new manufacturing projects.
That's the part of the business we enjoy most.
Making something that didn't exist before.
Clear Prospects Ltd
UK Manufacturing • Product Development • Digital Printing • Online Retail • Trade Supply
Founded in 1999.
Manufacturing in Blackburn, Lancashire since 2000.
Made in Britain. Developed by us. Supplied to customers around the world.