Firms in Essex have secured order of over £120 million over the past 20 years – all through one construction firm.
BAM Construction, part of the worldwide Royal BAM Group, tracked the orders in the 20 years since 1999. But the firm’s work in the county of Essex actually dates back to 1879! The company was established just 10 years before that, making it one of the UK’s oldest construction firms.
Adam Harding, BAM Construction’s regional director for the South East, said:
“This year we completed a multi-storey car park for Stansted Airport, and it made us reflect on what other schemes we might have delivered across Essex.
“We’ve dug into the archives and found over 30 schemes dating back to when we built the War Office in Waltham Abbey for the Government in 1879, exactly 140 years ago.
“That job was priced at £12,400. Today, that’s something like £2 million. It isn’t just the money that’s changed of course. Our business is unrecognisable now – we are cleaner, safer, and highly technological.
“When we began, our materials moved around by horse and cart. Now we have drone pilots and virtual reality engineers. But construction has always been about people – collaborative relationships between designers, engineers, clients and sub-contractors.
“And that’s one reason we value the firms with whom we have placed those orders. Our supply chain in Essex has exported its skills across the UK. We score them on every aspect of what they do from quality and sustainability through to their attitude. And we pick the best – because it is how well you work with others that makes the critical difference.”
