Yorkshire business sews seeds for the future with investment

A GRANT from the Leeds City Region Enterprise Partnership (LEP) has helped sewing and light fabrication specialist MB Products expand its business and production by moving to a larger factory site, creating five new jobs.

The business has been awarded a grant from the LEP’s Business Growth Programme, which is supported by the government’s Regional Growth Fund. The £50,000 grant has enabled the company to purchase a bigger factory in Barnsley, a vital move to help the business to continue to grow.

Roger Marsh, chair of the Leeds City Region Enterprise Partnership, said: “MB Products is a specialist manufacturer and as such requires advanced facilities to allow it to fulfil its potential. We are therefore delighted to have been able to assist the company to move to larger premises, retaining a growing business in one of our key sectors and resulting in new employment opportunities for people living in the Leeds City Region.

“I am pleased to hear that as a result of the new investment, MB Products is now able to take forward work it initially had to turn down due to capacity issues, and now the business is able to continue its goal of increasing the unique services it provides.”

The business currently works in sectors ranging from healthcare to the military, supplying products that have been designed and manufactured in close collaboration with the end user.

MB Product’s previous factory was unable to cope with the company’s growing work-load demand and the grant, part of a £500,000 investment, has allowed the business to move sites to a larger factory, employ five new members of staff and develop bespoke working systems to enhance its expansion

Roger Godfrey, managing director at MB Products, said: “Our move has enabled the flow of work on the shop floor to become much more efficient. In our previous factory work was stretched across three floors – now it is all on one. This time saving improvement has helped our company to meet the ever increasing demand we are seeing from our expanding customer base.”

The company’s expansion has also been backed by European-funded business support programme Enterprising Barnsley, which is run by Barnsley Council.