JCB's Uttoxeter factory clinches Dutch hire firm deal
Jun 23 2009 by Graeme Brown, Birmingham Post
One of JCB’s newest business ventures is celebrating its biggest-ever order after securing a deal from a leading international hire company worth almost £500,000.
The Staffordshire company’s light equipment division recently began manufacturing at the £7 million JCB Attachments factory in Uttoxeter in a bid to grow its share of the multi-million pound light compaction equipment market.
Now the commitment to the sector is reaping dividends after Dutch-based Bo-Rent placed an order for 290 units including rammers, forward vibratory plates and reversible vibratory plates. The equipment is used in smaller scale construction projects where earth, stone and hardcore needs compacting.
JCB sales operations director Chris Spring said: “This represents the single largest deal to date for JCB light equipment and it is testament to the high quality and robustness of our products that one of Europe’s leading hirers has placed this order.”
The JCB Light Equipment Division is designed to build JCB’s presence in a market where almost 130,000 units are sold every year. The equipment is produced under the JCB Vibromax brand.
The light compaction equipment market generates annual sales of £250 million and has huge potential for JCB and the new JCB Attachments factory, which opened last year, gives the company a real opportunity to build its business in this sector and increase sales. Europe and North America offer the largest opportunity for growth in this sector, with hire companies and utility firms being the largest customers.
Bo-Rent began life as a hardware store in Amsterdam in 1974 and has grown into a major hirer of equipment to the construction industry with 65 depots in Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg employing more than 350 people.
The digger giant, which employs thousands of workers in Staffordshire, won a £14 million order from the French military for a fleet of its market leading backhoe loaders last week.
The deals come as welcome respite for the firm which has been hit hard by the construction sector downturn and axed about 1,600 jobs in the region since last summer amid a slump in demand due to falling consumer confidence. It now employs about 4,000 people.
