Industrial deals spree adds £30m to BIG’s turnover

THE Bowdon Investment Group has announced six acquisitions  – including five businesses from the administrators of industrial group Wordsworth Holdings.

The deals spree will add more than £30m to Bowdon’s turnover and includes the Barford and Fruehauf brands.

Fruehauf which makes truck trailers has sales of around £12m. Burford Site Dumpers, which turns over £16m, makes high capacity dumper trucks.

The deal also included Huffey Group, which designs and manufactures doors and windows for HM Prison Service. 

BIG has also snapped up WH Rentals, which rents out bulk tipper trucks and Euroforce, which supplies skilled labour to the manufacturing sector..

Grantham, Lincolnshire-based Wordsworth was placed into administration in March after the recession hit its sales and losses mounted.

Saul Loggenberg, co-founder of Bowdon Investments said: “This is a landmark deal for us and will take group to £120m turnover.

“We’ve brought two really strong brands in Barford and Fruehaulf and we want to boost international sales and get all the new businesses back into profit.”

Mr Loggenberg did not reveal the terms of the deal but said an agreement on a  10 year lease on a 62-acre site in Grantham had been agreed.

“We’ve brought back the previous management team led by James Kearsey, sales director David Snodin and production director Terry Whyman. The recession has clearly hit sales and we believe the recovery in the business will have to be export-led.

“The deals fit well with our strategy of investing in British manufacturing and I’m expecting to announce more soon.”

Separately Bowdon has acquired Macclesfield-based Radius Design and Marketing, a web design, events and marketing business whose biggest client is Siemens.

Like the Wordsworth companies, Radius was bought out of administration.