Construction firm in gear for bumper year with £55m order book
Bardsley Construction is in bullish mood as it looks ahead to a strong performance for 2017, boosted by a £55m order book.
The Greater Manchester-based, family-owned business achieved an increase in turnover despite unstable conditions following the UK voting for Brexit at the EU Referendum.
The provider of building services to the public and private sectors has its headquarters in Dukinfield and regional offices for Yorkshire and the Midlands.
It increased annual turnover to £51.36m from £50.74m in the financial year ended 31 December 2016, and generated a pre-tax profit of £820,000 (2015: £1.69m) and an operating profit of £860,000 (2015: £1.73m) in the period.
In his strategic report on the financial year, managing director Paul Strutt said Bardsley was on track for a strong performance in the year to December 2017 with a “good pipeline” of work.
The firm said it was benefiting from a proactive strategy to widen its portfolio of work to avoid being “overly reliant” on specific and traditional sectors. While continuing to specialise in education, elderly care and housing, the firm diversified to include projects in commercial, leisure, hotels and student accommodation.
Strutt said: “Pipeline opportunities are good and the secured order book for 2017 is in excess of £55m, which already represents the majority of the budgeted turnover for the year with a further £9m expected to convert to ‘secured’ by June 2017.”
Reflecting on 2016, he said: “The Government Budget announcements in July 2015 continued to impact the public sector housing market well into 2016 and the Referendum brought with it further unstable conditions in the summer that impacted the appetite for investment.
“These conditions created delays in contracts starting on site and have been the single most important challenge for us as a business as we sought to replace delays with the right work for our business.”
Strutt said the affordable housing market in particular was slow to address the impact of uncertainty caused by the Brexit vote with a consequent delay in public sector work impacting the overall profitability of Bardsley in 2016.
But he added that Bardsley had seen a marked rise in enquiry levels since the autumn of 2016 thanks to a “much more buoyant market place”.
“Whilst offering a substantial proportion of our workload, the wide spectrum of work has been monitored closely to ensure we are not too reliant on any one client or sector,” he said.
The firm, with 177 staff, is on ten major delivery frameworks with a total value of £1.9bn covering sectors such as housing, extra care, education and other public sector buildings.
Chairman Roly Bardsley said: “2017 looks like being our busiest year yet, so I’m delighted that we are steadily increasing our turnover, however, profit margins remain tight.”
