Yorkshire Business Insider - Chris McDonald

Chris McDonald, 41 - Managing Director, The Trading Floor and www.thecomparisons.com

After many years working for some of Yorkshire’s top law firms in a sales capacity, McDonald found himself working for a company that specialised in internet lending. He quickly realised that much of the data such companies collected was wasted. McDonald felt there had to be some use for this. “After all, much of the data industry is based on incorrect information,” he says. The result was the formation of Sowerby Bridge based The Trading Floor, a company which specialises in collating “wasted” data and selling it on. “We take the data for nothing, and if we successfully sell it on we share back half the proceeds with the original owner,” he say. The company has over 500 clients, including Barclays, Norwich Union and Asda.

Its success spurred McDonald on in 2007 to launch www.thecomparisons.com, a price comparison site that McDonald says sets itself out from the opposition by charging all companies who want to be featured the same flat fee. He’s already in discussions about customising the site for clients including football clubs and airlines. “It’s exactly how MBNA launched themselves in this country.” he says. “They were producing affinity cards for other people for years before they launched any of their own.”

(Yorkshire Business Insider - Jan 2008)