As I toured the 130,000sq ft factory in Bretton and spoke with managing director Doug hacking, he pointed out that production for April 2008 to April 2009 was projected to be 10 times the initial and previous year, turnover by 2010 should hit £10 million and that current staffing of 75 was expected to double in the next two years.

But it was the trademarked product itself, also called E-Leather, which intrigued me. The E stands for "engineered" or "environmental" or "economic".

But what is it?

"The product which is made from whatever a tannery throws away" is how Doug likes to promote it.

More precisely, it is a material whose major ingredient is leather fibre derived from tannery by-products.

The business receives waste from tanneries in the UK and other EU countries, in its free issue boxes, to control the quality of the incoming material.

"Through a process developed in-house and technology, we produce what is effectively leather on a roll with properties that are engineered to suit the application," said Doug.

"This has been a 'holy grail' in many leather applications to produce a consistent material without the drawbacks of the physical and quality variability of natural leather."

Leather is a great product which is universally associated with quality, but it can be "terribly variable".

Designed-in properties of E-leather include low weight, high strength and fire resistance for airplane, train, hotel and other contract upholstery applications.

The company's lead aviation customer is Thomas Cook. It was the first aircraft operator to use E-Leather commercially and now has six a330 aircraft with E-Leather seating, which it has found retain their shape and looks much better than natural leather.