News Article
A fledgling Tees Valley firm is targeting fresh opportunities in the untapped North East housebuilding market for its timber framed homes.
Husband and wife Simon and Sandy Bliss have turned their back on successful careers to devote all their energies to their timber house manufacturing business Datum.
Based in Cowpen Lane Industrial Estate, Billingham, the company employing ten staff turned over £500,000 in its first six months with £2m worth of forward orders secured – all in the North East marketplace.
The couple called in experts from the North East Productivity Alliance to analyse its working practices to ensure they were operating as efficiently as possible to fulfil a growing number of orders.
They have incorporated the skills accrued from their years in artistic design into their company, to offer a full business solutions service to independent and major corporate homebuilders, from initial timber design to manufacture and construction on site.
Simon, 46, was formerly a London-based professional photographer who captured bands such as The Clash on film, while 49-year-old Sandy, previously an art director with IPC magazines in the 1980s, oversaw photoshoots with the likes of Duran Duran and Depeche Mode at the height of their fame.
Simon moved on to run his own building development company in the Lake District and was sales director at a North East timber frame business before he and Sandy decided to go it alone.
“I had looked at the predicted growth of the timber framed homes industry and it was going to grow at 30% year on year – with the market having doubled in size by 2010,” said Simon.
“Timber framed housing construction has many advantages over more traditional masonry methods in that it is very quick to build, can be erected in all weathers, is far more thermally efficient and leaves far less of a carbon footprint on the environment during its construction.
“In my previous job, I quickly realised that just a fraction of our business was being done in the North East which I thought was crazy and a great business opportunity.”
“Working with Simon is great, we have similar backgrounds and we bounce ideas off each other,” said Sandy, a former lecturer in design at Cumbria Institute of the Arts.
“Our team here shares the passion to do things differently, we have a great deal of manufacturing, design and technical depth within our business and we very much encourage staff ownership and participation in decision making.”
Datum has received extensive public sector backing in establishing its business from Tees Valley Regeneration, Stockton Borough Council, the Midas programme and Business Link Tees Valley.
The NEPA programme is based within One North East which is funding the project to the tune of £9.4m until 2009.
Colin Herron, Head of NEPA’s Dissemination of Best Practice programme, said: “We have been able to work with the company to design an optimum flow from raw materials, through the manufacturing process and on to storage ready for dispatch.
“This has resulted in the company being able to double its turnover without having to double the number of staff.”
Recent environmental legislation will place a growing emphasis on homebuilders to use more timber framed, carbon free home construction over the next decade.
The company is aiming for a £5m turnover within the next three years by focusing on the North East timber framed market which as yet is virtually untapped by commercial housebuilders.
The company has just invested £15,000 in the latest 3D design software and sources all its wood from sustainable forests in Scandinavia. Datum is based in the former home of shopfitters Jarvis Newman in the shadow of the Tees Valley chemicals industry.
Ends.
For further information please contact:
Gordon Arnott, Senior Press Officer, One North East.
Tel:(0191) 229 6309 Fax:(0191) 229 6234 Mobile: 07713 317883
e-mail: gordon.arnott@onenortheast.co.uk
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