Leeds entrepreneur Tayo Adebisi has secured up to £200,000 in trade loans for Tilz Prosperitas after a UK Government-backed referral through UK Export Finance’s Export Assist, brokered by Dynamic Funding. The e‑commerce brand, best known for gift sets and Advent calendars, will use the facility to meet peak European demand and step into North America, including a major US supermarket and plans for Canada.

Founded in 2017 with £5,000, Adebisi’s flagship TilzCollection scaled to a £3 million turnover within four years. Covid then squeezed working capital: suppliers needed paying sooner, freight costs jumped and product development stalled. After several banks declined, the West Yorkshire Combined Authority connected her to Moustafa Elgendy, an International Trade Adviser at the Department for Business and Trade, and Alissia Deane, UKEF’s Export Finance Manager for West Yorkshire, who helped map the finance options and route to specialist lending.

Seasonality is the real constraint here. Advent calendars and gifting lines must be ordered, manufactured and shipped months ahead of December, while big retailers often pay on 60–90‑day terms. That timing gap ties up cash long before sales land in the bank. A focused trade loan narrows that order‑to‑cash gap so inventory moves on time without starving the rest of the business.

In this case, Dynamic Funding arranged two trade loans totalling up to £200,000 following UKEF’s Export Assist introduction. Export Assist doesn’t lend directly; it connects smaller exporters to private lenders who understand purchase orders, shipping documents and cross‑border risk. For a founder, that network often matters as much as the headline rate.

The timing is deliberate. Tilz Prosperitas is fulfilling holiday orders across the Netherlands, Germany, France and Spain while preparing first shipments for a US supermarket chain and setting up Canadian distribution. Management also plans to diversify beyond seasonal lines so revenues are less bunched around Q4, improving cash conversion through the year.

For readers weighing similar moves, think finance, operations and risk as a single plan. Finance bridges deposits, production and freight through to invoice payment; operations cover retailer compliance from labelling to barcodes; risk spans FX, product liability and customer credit. We see this pattern frequently in seasonally skewed e‑commerce: margins can look healthy while cash flow does not.

According to UKEF, partnering with brokers such as Dynamic Funding expands flexible options for SMEs and reduces missed export opportunities. The agency reports a record £14.5 billion in new support in the last financial year, helping over 667 UK companies and supporting up to 70,000 jobs under the government’s Plan for Change.

The announcement sits alongside the Regional Investment Summit, which convenes investors, policymakers and local leaders. For West Yorkshire, the practical takeaway is clear: a referral chain that turns a busy order book into shipped product and paid invoices, with regional advisers smoothing the policy-to‑practice gap.

A practical guardrail for any exporter is to model the cash gap, not just the gross margin. If a retailer pays on 90 days and suppliers want 30 per cent on order and 70 per cent pre‑shipment, working capital will be tied up for months. On a hypothetical 120‑day cycle, a £150,000 draw at 12 per cent APR costs roughly £6,000 in interest-pricing and inventory plans should account for that.

The challenge now is execution at scale. If the US rollout lands cleanly, North American volume plus a broader, less seasonal range could lift cash generation and reduce reliance on short‑term debt. That would put Tilz Prosperitas in a stronger position to explore new markets flagged by the company, including Australia, China and Mexico.