Web consultants 'slow you down'

Don't use consultants to build your website - they'll only slow you down. That's the advice from football portal Umbro.com, after it created its web presence in one month with only three staff.

Umbro.com launched on 7 July, in time for an advertising campaign based around the new Premiership football season.

The company worked with server supplier Sun Microsystems and internet service provider Level 3 Communications to implement the system.

"I'd advise anyone to do all the work in-house. Don't trust consultants. It's one of the easiest installations I've done because of the lack of bureaucracy," said Bernie Thurston, head of infrastructure at the football kit supplier.

"With your own team, you can just get on and do it," he added. "Cut through all the red tape [and the] speed of implementation is so much faster."

The key to success for Umbro.com has been to keep it simple to start with, but to plan for future growth.

"Our aim was to put a backbone in place first, so we can then build up as required," said Thurston. "Nobody has produced the perfect website - it's a learning process. You may not always get it right first time, but at least there is something to build on."