COMMENT & OPINION THE BLOCKS ARE BACK
Matthew Carter, Sales Director at H+H, on the successful completion of a significant investment for the company
H+H DOESN’T DO things the same way that other companies do, my Managing Director reminded me as he was explaining why, at the point when the market was particularly buoyant, he was proposing to shut down one third of our manufacturing capacity. Well it transpires that we actually do do things differently at H+H. We completed a multi- million pound rebuild of our Borough Green factory on time (slightly ahead of time, in fact) and to plan. Having been in the manufacturing sector for over twenty years, that made a refreshing change for me. When it was originally built in the 1980s the Borough Green plant was state of the art. Not surprisingly, thirty years later it was showing its age and starting to give us reliability challenges. Our stock is very closely managed and the last thing we need is a hiatus in manufacturing that unexpectedly interrupts supply.
No tinkering
Taking pre-emptive action, the UK business planned the upgrade. Not so much a tinkering about with the details, more a full-scale rebuild of the production line. It’s not a cheap thing to do and we were delighted that our Danish parent company, seeing the long- term promise in the UK market, agreed to finance the project. Especially as the Brexit vote happened just as the decision was being made.
We listened as other
manufacturers quietly shelved their investment plans on a “wait and see” policy, and felt grateful again that the privately owned H+H does not always behave like other companies.
Having made the decision to go ahead, we spent over a year planning for a prolonged shutdown. All three of our UK
production plants went into overdrive to build stocks and we lined up some of our European plants to support us with product to add to the numbers. Our biggest challenge was to manage demand, maintaining consistent supply throughout and keeping customers up to date with progress at every stage. H+H has always chosen to build long- term relationships of trust with customers and the value of this approach was emphasised again and again as we worked together to plan supply arrangements over many months
Stock control was managed minutely, but given the volume of blocks moving out of our yards every day, there was little room for error. Having done the sums, we knew exactly when the plant needed to be up and running again and were reassured when, as scheduled, the first blocks rolled off the new line. This was a masterclass in project management and teamwork. German manufacturer Wehrhahn designed the new plant and, although specialising in factories of this type, the Wehrhahn engineers worked closely with our own production team to understand the precise requirements of the UK processes. Several visits to Germany enabled our team to oversee the design of the equipment and make their own suggestions for refinements that would suit our own factory and working practices.
Once each piece of machinery was completed, it was comprehensively stress-tested before delivery – we simply didn’t have time for anything not to work as intended. We made our last batch of blocks in the old factory in December 2017 and then effectively closed our site to anyone not immediately involved in the upgrade.
August 2018
www.buildersmerchantsjournal.net
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Once each piece of machinery was completed, it was comprehensively stress-tested before delivery – we simply didn’t have time for anything not to work as intended.
By the time our office staff arrived back after Christmas the old factory was gone and teams of our engineers were working in shifts to prepare the new equipment. The installation was carried out by our own teams, with Wehrhahn engineers on site constantly to oversee the work and to troubleshoot – working ways around the inevitable
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glitches that occur in a project of this scale.
By the time we approached Easter it was very clear that the project was running entirely to plan and in retrospect it was no surprise at all that everything worked exactly as it should: but very pleasing.
Up and running Three months on from the first production run and the new factory is fully up to speed. When running at full volume it produces 37% greater volume than the old factory and, thanks to a slightly different cutting process, customers may notice a tighter dimensional tolerance in the blocks too.
So Celcon Blocks are back at Borough Green - now the most technically advanced aircrete plant in Europe. The “new” factory is to have an official opening day in September when we look forward to demonstrating the speed and efficiency at which it operates. BMJ
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