Packaging expansion set to create 20 jobs
A thriving packaging company is creating 20 new jobs after investing in an expansion of its West Bromwich headquarters to further boost productivity.
CBS Packaging has installed a new all-weather canopy which allows its team to use more space, adding an extra 10,000 sq ft to its existing 160,000 sq ft factory in Brandon Way.
Managing director Jitha Singh said the extra productivity was necessary to keep up with demand in a busy year, which has also seen CBS Packaging acquire 70-year-old Connect Packaging of Benfleet in Essex, to strengthen its position as a leading packaging supplier.
He added that as a long-established Black Country family firm, he was keen to work with a local company on the new facility and commissioned Wolverhampton-based Preptech and Steel & Cladding of Cannock.
"This has been a collaboration of Midlands companies and it has been achieved on deadline with no disruption to our usual operations.
"Preptech and Steel & Cladding have done a fantastic job, along with the full supervision of our health and safety department.
"I'm very grateful that the work has been completed in less than six weeks."
CBS Packaging, which currently employs around 80 people, has already invested heavily in digital printing and the management team says the company is always on the look-out for new acquisitions.
"This has been a good year for us and we are delighted to be ending it on a high with this expansion of production," said Mr Singh.
"Our business model hasn't changed over the years. We want to grow year on year. We've got established distribution networks operating in the Midlands, London and the South East, and Northern England so it may be that we consider the North East next.
"Looking ahead, with regards to customers, being able to manufacture our own board gives is the edge over other independents, because most of them order from out of house suppliers."
Steel & Cladding managing director Ivan Bullock said he and Steve Morgan from Preptech had been delighted to work together to find the right solution for CBS.
He said: "Together, we co-ordinate the design, fabrication and installation of structural steelwork, incorporating all roofing and cladding.
"We've 30 years of experience of working together and we called on this to help us address the unique design challenges of meeting CBS's specific requirements.
"Lorries needed to be able to manoeuvre under the canopy. Our cantilevered canopy design provided an interrupted, open and free space where articulated lorries could move.
"To make best use of the space, this resulted in turning the canopy through 90 degrees from our original plan to provide as flexible and efficient solution as possible."
CBS, which was founded in 1996 and was initially based in Digbeth, Birmingham, has been at its current five-acre site in West Bromwich since 2010 when it moved from its previous 33,000 sq ft site in Smethwick.
