£60m order book of Booming Builder

_{Brenig Construction Ltd; Pictured are Mark Parry and Howard Vaughan Managing Directors of Brenig. Picture Mandy Jones}

A fast-growing North Wales builder has announced an order book bulging with £60 million of work including plans for 300 new homes in the next four years.

Mochdre-based Brenig Construction have doubled their turnover in the last 12 months to over £20 million and are currently working on sites from Bangor to Winsford in Cheshire.

It’s a rapid rise for the firm founded by joint managing directors Mark Parry and Howard Vaughan who started the business together in 2012 and now employ over 70 staff.

Howard Vaughan said: “We have strong connections with major housing associations in North Wales and we are also breaking new ground in Cheshire and in Shropshire.

“We have really hit the ground running since last year’s first lockdown ended and have secured a number of major contracts while we’re also in the running for a number of others.

“We have also built up an expertise in the construction of low energy passivhaus homes, working with one of the UK leaders in the field, Beattie Passive, and we believe this will become increasingly important.

“It’s the future of construction and having the expertise and competencies in this field and a record of achievement puts us in a good position within the industry.”

Their passivhaus projects, among the first of their kind in Wales, are in Old Colwyn, Llanrwst and in Denbigh where a 22-property development for Denbighshire County Council has just started.

Passivhaus uses sophisticated insulation, triple-glazed windows and air-circulation systems, to keep out cold in winter and heat in summer to achieve a stable and comfortable temperature so there are savings of up to 90 per cent in energy costs on traditional building stock.

The work for Denbighshire involves them in the first council house building programme in the county in 30 years with the new homes heated by a ground source system.

In Cheshire a joint private housing scheme venture with Calon Homes is under way in Middlewich with nine of the eleven properties already sold off-plan

They are also going to be involved in a major 21-home project with one of the UK’s biggest housing associations, the Guinness Trust, in Crewe and another project with another major housing provider, the Muir Trust, in Winsford.

Mark Parry said: “It’s very exciting to be involved in cutting-edge passivhaus projects which will revolutionise construction techniques for the future.

“We have in the region of £8 million of these kind of contracts on our books and we see this as a way forward for construction with the emphasis on new, green building methods likely to become even more important in future when it will be vital to have these capabilities.

“Overall we feel the potential for growth is huge and certainly we feel that the outlook is good and the volume of work should catapult us up the rankings of North Wales construction companies.”

It’s a positive outlook for a company established by two young civil engineers who first met as six-year-olds at their local youth club in Glan Conwy in 1987.

They first worked together at Dawnus Construction which they left to found Brenig in 2012 and their first major contract was a high-profile environmental improvement programme on the Parc Peulwys estate in Llysfaen above Old Colwyn for Cartrefi Conwy housing association.

In 2018 they moved into new headquarters at the business park in Mochdre which they built for Cartrefi Conwy with whom they work together as Calon Homes with Creating Enterprise, a subsidiary of the housing association.

They are also a growing presence in the housebuilding sector as Brenig Homes and have expertise in civil engineering and groundworks while their portfolio now also includes maintenance, social housing, commercial housing and plant hire.

Source: Wales 247