EXECUTIVE REPORT
Lord depots are located on trading estates with good transport links.
Fit for a Lord
Alan Guthrie visits the Newcastle headquarters of Lord Hire Centres, a long- established independent with nine depots throughout the north east of England.
Lord Hire Centres’ story is one of steady expansion and evolution. When the Newcastle-based business was established in 1965 it was operating from a High Street shop offering small equipment that you could collect in a car or van. Today it offers a much broader range, having carefully adapted its operations to meet market requirements.
The business was founded by Reg Lord. His sons-in-law, Chris Rowley and the late Tim Hodgkiss, became Directors in 1980 and drove the business forward, adopting the current trading name of Lord Hire Centres.
Today, the company has nine depots located in Alnwick, Blaydon, Blyth, Durham, Gateshead, Middlesbrough, Newcastle, South Shields and
Sunderland, of typically 2,000ft2
upwards in
size. “At one time, the business had 20 locations as it grew to meet demand from local firms and home owners,” said General Manager Carl Bartlett, who joined as an electrical fitter at
and larger equipment was added. Indeed, in the early days, the fleet included items such as sunbeds and Santa suits, but these were phased out as we concentrated on core products. We also used to hire out tools such as picks and shovels, which declined as mechanisation replaced labouring by hand. In the tough business climate, customers increasingly won contracts further afield in areas like York, Ripon and Scarborough, and we needed to support them. We re-located the Newcastle head office to a nearby business park, and, over the years, we have added three adjoining units to enable us to have a facility covering approximately 8,000ft2
.
Carl Bartlett, left, with Operations & Sales Manager Malcom Morris, centre, and Technical Manager Michael Baird.
Newcastle in 1989 and progressed quickly to become Depot Manager at Gateshead, a position he held for nine years. He was subsequently Operations Manager for 16 years, before taking up his present role a year ago. “There used to be depots in towns including Berwick, Richmond and Whitley Bay, for example, plus a second Newcastle branch, and we added others through acquisitions such as Shore Tool Hire in Birtley, which was eventually re-located to Blaydon, and Monarch Tool Hire in Harrogate.
Streamlined operation
“However, we had begun to streamline the operation before the recession started in 2008. As a number of the depots were high street premises, they were no longer suited to changing needs in terms of customer parking and storage space as our range grew
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“We expanded other depots where we could, and re-located others. The idea of having larger sites on trading estates with ample space and good road links was appealing. They could store more equipment and cover a larger radius, so fewer locations were needed overall. We monitor our operations carefully. We closed a depot in Gosforth last year that was on a busy roundabout where five main roads converge.
It had been very successful, but the local authority implemented extensive roadworks to change the traffic flow, leading to congestion. Customers were already having difficulty reaching us to collect equipment early mornings or return it later in the afternoons. We realised we could serve these customers from our other sites, so we closed it, retained all the employees and lost very few clients. Geographically we cover an area from North Yorkshire to the Scottish Borders.”
Lord Hire Centres, which currently has a team of 60 people, offers a broad range of tools and equipment, such as Hilti breakers, Timberwolf chippers, Obart pumps, Boss aluminium tower, compact scissor lifts, Master heaters and dehumidifiers from Hire Supply Co, gardening machinery from Stihl, Husqvarna and Camon, Belle
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