Mayor of London congratulates Shackerley on success

Shackerley has welcomed Boris Johnson to its Chorley site where 70 of the company’s 100-strong workforce are employed.

The Mayor of London was accompanied by parliamentary candidate for Chorley, Rob Loughenbury, who was keen to showcase a thriving and innovative Lancashire manufacturing company that was supporting the UK construction industry.

The visitors heard how Shackerley, an independent, family-owned SME, had developed the UK market for ceramic granite ventilated cladding systems throughout the noughties with its pioneering Sureclad system – winner of a Queen’s Award for Enterprise in the Innovation category, and today the clear market leader.

Chief executive Brian Newell also his mission to forge new markets overseas for the cladding system, starting with the USA, Canada, Brazil and Central Europe, where he has already established trading platforms through alliances with overseas partners.

In the factory the party saw how Shackerley transforms exceptionally hard and strong large format ceramic granite slabs into fully prefabricated facade panels, ready to deliver to site for rapid installation onto a Sureclad support system. They saw the substantial investment made in bespoke engineering facilities, developed in-house to give Shackerley the capacity to cope with its exponential growth in demand.

Boris Johnson was interested to hear about the company’s heavy involvement with high profile construction projects in London, and was briefed on recently completed developments such as the Hilton London Wembley and University Square Stratford which have distinctive exterior envelopes, clad with Sureclad ceramic granite ventilated cladding. He also congratulated Brian Newell and his team for securing contracts to supply several massive developments currently under way in London, including Woodberry Down Estate, Kingston Heights and Kingston Riverside.

The Mayor of London was surprised to discover that Shackerley was also a key supplier to London Underground (LU) and Network Rail. He heard how, over the past 15 years, Shackerley has helped to make hundreds of Tube and overground rail stations more accessible and safer for those with visual impairments with its ceramic granite All Weather Tactile Tiles designed to highlight potential hazards such as ramps, staircases and, critically, platform edges. Brian Newell commented: “We are absolutely delighted that Shackerley was specially selected for this high profile visit by Boris Johnson. It was a superb opportunity to show him how we have managed to make a massive impact in the worlds of architecture and construction across the whole of the UK, and I was particularly pleased to reveal to him how many exciting  high profile projects we are working on in his beloved capital city.”