Be my Guest…Phil Smith
Sister companies LGH and Rotrex have joined forces to open a warehouse in Erith, South East London, driving better customer service, facilitating expansion plans and increasing investment in equipment over the coming years.
The new site, which includes a large one-acre yard and workshop facilities, follows the decision to close depots in Crayford (LGH) and Rainham (Rotrex).
The benefit of the flagship Erith hub will be better and more centralised access for collections and deliveries and a broader range of LGH’s hoisting, jacking, material handling and pulling equipment available for hire that will complement Rotrex’s fleet of winch and winch ancillary equipment. Rotrex’s 360-degree service offering will also be available.
Here to tell us more is Phil Smith, operations director LGH and Rotrex Europe.
“We recently amalgamated our locations in Rainham for our Rotrex business and Crayford for our LGH business into a joint site in Erith. Space has always been a premium for us at both locations, particularly outdoor storage and this new location in Erith gives us 20 times the space outside, internally slightly less, but most of our products work outside. So that's working well for us really well,” said Smith.
“We've been really lucky to get a new team into our Rotrex business in Erith. We recently appointed Paul Skingle, our new service centre manager. Paul brings with him many years’ experience in the winching range. He worked for one of our main competitors and what we're really looking to do now is upskill the capabilities of our Erith location so that we provide a much better service to our customers in the South and take some pressure off our central workshops in Alfreton.”
LGH and Rotrex are both members of LEEA with LEEA trained technicians.
“LGH was originally founded back in the 1970s. We were the original members of the Chain Testers Association of Great Britain (CTA). (The official name of LEEA before it was named LEEA). In fact, Bill Parkinson, our founder was the chairman at CTA before it became LEEA in 1998. So, we've been members for a long time,” added Smith.
“And LGH UK was originally sold to Speedy Hire back in 2006 and we reopened the business in 2016 and at that point we rejoined LEEA after one year of operation because obviously you have to have something going on to become a member. We put a YouTube in place, and we've trained people through earlier and obviously we've taken on people that already have the qualifications as well. So, we've got a well-qualified team, and we want to expand that further.”
Next, the sister companies are looking to further expand with more locations.
“We're opening LGH Alfreton. So Alfreton is our main Rotrex Central Workshop. We're just in the process of launching the provision there. Similarly in Motherwell, near Glasgow, we're doing the same thing there, only LGH within Rotrex and eventually probably within 12 months we will relocate more towards central Glasgow to give us a better footprint. In the UK, we're also looking at locations in France. We want to further expand into Europe as well. So, lots going on within the organisation,” said Smith.
“We will also be attending LEEA LiftEx in London Olympia West October 16-17 with colleagues from LGH USA attending as well. So it's going to be a really strong presence from from LGH.”
Click here to watch the video on LEEA YouTube channel.
For more information about LiftEx visit the website here
