PEOPLE
ON THE MOVE
10 MINUTES WITH: CRAIG BALDWIN
Joint Founder and CEO of Building Supplies Online
What is your current role and how long have you been doing it? Joint Founder and CEO at Building Supplies Online – 10 years
What does your role entail? Delivering a strategic hyper growth plan over the next 3-5 years , ensuring we build a great business at the same time.
How did you get started in this industry? My twin brother Ian and I Initially set up a website for our father to sell aggregates online. Within a few months and after looking at the initial sales and visitor numbers it became clear we were onto something much bigger.
What roles were you doing before and how did they prepare you for this one? I was a partner in a quantity surveying practice in London, so I dealt with construction companies on a regular basis which certainly helped me understand the products that we would eventually sell online.
What would you like to achieve in your role?
Achievement for me would be to build a great and enduring business and one that continues to go from strength to strength for years to come. Fundamentally, if I can delight our customers, I think that would give a great sense of achievement.
What has been the highlight of your career so far? I think it was probably when we signed off on our partnership with Cairngorm Capital just over a year ago. It’s fantastic that we have the support and expertise from the business to really push Building Supplies Online on to where we all believe it can get to.
What do you see as the main issues for builders merchants and for the construction industry at
8
the moment? For Builders Merchants I think it’s going to be tough for them to attract new customers in the longer term as people are increasingly purchasing from online players such as ourselves. They know it’s moving online, and they will need to move quickly in order to improve their offering.
The construction industry
is going to face a huge skills shortage in the coming years – what does that mean? Well, construction methods will have to change i.e. the prefabricated solution will be far more relevant. If we need to build more houses where will the tradesmen come from? Leaving the EU has simply compounded the issue.
If you could go back to the start of your career, what piece of advice would you give yourself? Failure is good so learn to accept it and not to shy away from it!
Football, rugby, cycling, golf or gardening – which one’s more likely to keep you busy at the weekends?
Golf, why? Because I love the challenge of trying to constantly improve with the social aspect of the sport.
If you’re at the bar – what are you drinking?
An Old Fashioned!
What’s your favourite book? Favourite film? Book: Good to Great by Jim Collins. Film: The Shawshank Redemption
If you could be a superhero, what super-power would you choose? The ability to read minds. BMJ
www.buildersmerchantsjournal.net July 2019 director.
Cullum is previously from Polypipe Civils, as the commercial division of Polypipe continues a year of transformation.
•
W.Howard Group has announced the appointment of Adrian McLean in the newly created role of Estimating & Costings Manager.
McLean has more than 30 years’ experience in the timber trade, starting in the industry as a trainee before taking on roles including Assistant Sales Manager, Assistant Branch Manager and Sales Representative.
• Shower designer and manufacturer, Roman, has announced Graham Speed as their new Commercial Director. Speed joined Roman 20 years ago
and has worked in various positions within the company prior to his new appointment.
• Elliotts Builders Merchant, has appointed a new Branch Manager to their branch in Tadley. Dan Viccars will be heading up the Elliotts
branch on the Brick Kiln Industrial Estate, Silchester Road.
Viccars comes to Elliotts with over 12 years of experience in the builders’ merchant trade, having worked in a range of management roles, including customer service and operations.
• BLANCO UK has continued to grow the sales team with the appointment Stuart Claydon as Sales Account Executive.
Claydon joins
the team having previously worked for Wilson Fink, Alno and Homebase.
• Polypipe Building Services, has appointed experienced water management systems (WMS) expert and civil engineer Andrew Cullum as managing
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