WITH the advance of super-smart phones and pads, is the end in sight for self- organisers and notebooks made of paper and card?

Charles Letts, scion of the great diary dynasty, a household name since the early 1800s, says that it is not. What’s more he claims to have behavioural science on his side.

He says: “We carry out regular research on this and a constant message is that people still want to write on paper. It is more trusted and reliable than electronic devices and a diary, organiser or notebook becomes a very personal product.”

From its headquarters in Dalkeith where 65% of the company’s ever-evolving range is still produced, Mr Letts has weathered the first phase of the information revolution. He intends to make the web’s capacity to personalise and tailor information work for the firm, rather than against it.

The company manufactures more than 22 million diaries a year and is firmly established as the UK market leader, supplying more than 40% of all branded diaries in the UK and exporting to over 75 countries. It is also contracted to produce the majority of diaries for Britain’s biggest stationers – WH Smith.

Perhaps even more ubiquitously, an exclusive contract with Gideon Bibles (see the drawer in your hotel room) accounts for 10% of turnover. The firm is also a prolific producer of address books and notebooks, which comprise a further 10%.

Thus a significant slice of the world’s diaries are produced from this unspectacular-looking facility in Midlothian. It is a great Scottish manufacturing success-story, whose commitment to constant innovation and an onerous quality checking regime is crucial to its continued success.

Mr Letts’s 250,000 sq ft factory employs 350 permanent and temporary staff, neatly incorporating customer service, printing, a bindery and an order fulfilment department. Diaries produced here are dispatched throughout the UK (65%) and the rest of the world (35%). The firm’s £23 million annual turn-over has remained constant over the last couple of recession-blighted years, while profitability was at 9% in 2010 from 9.5% in 2009, due to higher raw material and outsourcing costs.

Mr Letts is already fixated on Christmas, which should be a good one, given that the firm has the licence for diaries and personal organisers for London 2012, with all the opportunities for sponsorship tie-ups.

The London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games (LOCOG) intends to raise £70m from licensing revenue, and there is the opportunity to expose Letts to the all-important youth market.

The company, which is a division of the £60m-turnover Letts-Filofax Group, jointly owned by the management and venture capitalists Phoenix Equity Partners, produces approximately a third of its more labour intensive output in China and South Korea.

“If we can’t automate it here, we will go to the Far East,” Mr Letts says, referring to the more eye-catching products with elastic straps and bright plastic covers. The Far East is also used for topping up production when needed but given the short lead-times of the business, and the long shipping times to and from east Asia, the super-short turnaround capability of the Dalkeith plant is a matter of pride as well as commercial advantage.

The seasonal, fashion- influenced and short-shelf life nature of “paper-based time management products” means the company is exceptionally responsive and flexible.

The company’s longevity is due to its ability to anticipate demand and to adjust production schedules and manning levels accordingly.

Mr Letts adds: “It’s important to ensure that as a business we minimise unsold diaries at the end of the year but it is more critical that we identify trends and sales opportunities that we can action”

As Mr Letts explains, the shift to electronic PDAs and planning software has impacted the corporate diary market, the once-omnipresent customised leather-bound, gold-edged, tomes once universally distributed to executives and clients.

These have become as much a part of bygone business history as three-piece suits and boozy boardroom lunches. This part of Letts business-to-business market is under sustained pressure, not least because the biggest spenders, the financial institutions, have cut back on corporate baubles.

Although Letts still has important diary contracts, such as that with the Economist, the corporate market is a still-reducing 30% of Letts diary output. What gives Mr Letts the confidence that the personal diaries market will not follow the same trend?

“It’s difficult to predict how electronic devices are going to go and we are aware of the risk that electronic products present,” he admits. “While office diaries are certainly reducing, but the fact is that we know that people don’t tend to use the diary apps on electronic products, and that socially, diary usage is as strong as ever.”

Confident of its ground, Letts at Dalkeith has been investing heavily in a new plant that can produce ever-more imaginative variations on the basic diary format, more likely to catch the eye of youthful and fashion-conscious female buyers. They have also steered towards online customisation and ordering systems that allow the consumer market to enjoy the kind of personalisation advantages – in which photo albums and calendars also feature – once reserved for corporate clients. In the last year, online sales have grown by 30%.

“Retail is now our main area of focus,” Mr Letts says. “While the corporate customer wants the right product at the right price, the retail sale is very different, there is more room for engaging with the retail customer, though this is a competitive market.”

He adds: “We deal across a lot of markets and sectors in the UK and globally. The creative requirements are at their most demanding in the retail sector in which you are trying to sell products across a very broad range of retailer. The demands of WH Smith, Tesco, Harrods, and Paperchase are all very different and creativity plays a very important part in the approach.”

Mr Letts sees the main growth opportunities in brand-minded markets like Japan, where quality stationery is almost a national obsession and quality standards are too high for all but a few of UK manufacturers. Other growth markets include Australia, Russia, the Middle East and the US.

An important local employer, the firm combines the virtues of the old-fashioned family firm, with an emphasis on the annual intake of two apprentices and the retention of a highly skilled workforce, along with a determination to boost international and online sales.

“We would like to grow these elements, and become a £24m to£5m business. We are forecasting growth,” Mr Letts says.

Given that forward planning is so much a part of his business, such predictions carry huge conviction.