(L - R): Quantity surveyor Nick Wilson and managing director Ken Collins.

South Shields brickwork specialist celebrates “dramatic influx” of contracts totalling £10m

Although the year got off to a “slow start” for South Shields based Brickwork Direct Ltd, specialists in housing and commercial brickwork, the firm is experiencing a “dramatic influx” of new contracts over the last six weeks with a labour value of more than £10m.

As a supplier of bricklayers mostly to the residential development sector with a team of almost 200 tradesmen on its books, Brickwork Direct counts a range of housebuilders in both the private and social housing sectors as clients, including Gentoo, Keepmoat, Esh, Story Homes, Avant Homes and Partner Construction.

Over the last six weeks, the firm has picked up five sites for Miller Homes with a labour value of over £4.2m, four sites for Story Homes at Dunston, Alnwick, Darlington and Stockton and with others in the pipeline for Gentoo in Whitburn and Sunderland, has secured projects with a total labour value in excess of £10m.

Managing director Ken Collins is “familiar with the fluctuations of the industry”. As a time-served bricklayer himself with over 40 years of experience in the trade, he served as a sole trader on various schemes across Europe before establishing Brickwork Direct.

Ken commented: “We have a solid reputation with our clients. We only employ time-served, highly skilled bricklayers who take considerable pride in the job. Additionally, and importantly, we pledge to deliver on time, to budget and with zero defects.

“By mid-September we will have 50 squads of three staff, a labourer and two bricklayers, out on site on numerous projects across the region and we have another 12 projects, mainly with housebuilders, ready to negotiate. I believe that if we can help our clients to succeed, we will succeed too.”

Despite this recent influx of work, the market continues to be challenging and was “quite sluggish” at the start of the year with the estimating team, led by quantity surveyor, Nick Wilson, tendering for every project that came their way.

Their efforts are only now starting to bear fruit and although the cost of materials seems to have flattened out after a period when some suppliers would only guarantee costs for a matter of days, there are still some big challenges ahead, Ken believes.

Our Partners