Manufacturer targets growth after cracking US market

Colin Derbyshire and Kevin Taylor, from CV Rollers, with Caroline Cattle

A Shropshire manufacturer is targeting growth after securing a new funding deal.

Oswestry-based CV Rollers (TPP) specialises in the manufacture of bearing related products. It needs the extra capacity after breaking into new US markets.

It has secured grant support from the Marches Local Enterprise Partnership as part of the Marches Building Investment Grant, which is part-funded by the European Regional Development Fund.

The £97,000 grant is being used to pay for essential expansion work at the firm’s base on the Mile Oak Industrial Estate.

The business was formed in 1966 and acquired by current directors Kevin Taylor and Colin Derbyshire in 2013. Since their purchase, turnover has increased from £800,000 to more than £2.1m and the firm is now the market leader in its field.

It was the firm’s relationship with Hansen International, a global leader in commercial and industrial vehicle components, which expedited the need for further growth.

Mr Derbyshire said: “Our relationship with Hansen opened the US market to us and we’ve consequently secured orders with OEMs and two of the main fire truck manufacturers over there. Added to this, our business in the UK continues to expand on an almost daily basis.

“The impact it will have to our business cannot be underestimated. Simply, without it we wouldn’t have been able to contemplate such a rapid expansion and it’s likely that we’d have been looking at gradual growth over two to three years, as opposed to the six months that we’ll have achieved this in.”

The expansion has allowed the firm to create five new full-time jobs to supplement its existing workforce of 18. The building work has seen an extension built to side of its factory and the creation of a mezzanine floor from which further CAD design work and administration can be carried out.

Caroline Cattle, MBIG Programme Manager, said: “CV Rollers has enjoyed significant growth in recent years and as this continues, the need for additional space has become a priority. The extension and other renovations that the grant has facilitated will allow for not only new jobs in the immediate short term, but also future growth which could create additional jobs.”

The MBIG totals £2.5m and is open to businesses across Herefordshire, Shropshire and Telford & Wrekin which need to fund extensions, renovations or reconfigurations of commercial premises.

LEP director Gill Hamer added: “The difference made by schemes such as this shouldn’t be underestimated. Our previous Redundant Buildings Grant Scheme saw a rich and diverse range of buildings across the Marches transformed and brought back in to useful economic use.

“As one of the first project completions, the extension at CV Rollers demonstrates perfectly how the grant can facilitate both the conditions for immediate and longer term, growth and job creation.”

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