Armstrong Richardson is a great, family owned, local business success story and I was delighted to meet its executives and tour the facilities.
Through 170 employees, a fleet of 30 trucks and 4 retail Millbry Hill stores, the company sells pet food, horse food, livestock feed and a range of other farm, animal and outdoor related goods. It serves both wholesale and retail markets and has a strong online presence as well. Totally unrelated to that Armstrong Entertainments is a leading provider of entertainment event pieces like bouncy castles, games, casino tables, obstacle courses, trampolines, mini golf and more. I know where I am going for my daughter’s next birthday party!
As is common with other larger businesses like this, a key success factor is having availability of high quality, well connected space to locate and expand. Companies always have a choice of where to go, and it is important that our local business parks are attractive options for them. When companies like Armstrong Richardson want to expand they need finance. Because of the financial crisis, bank lending slowed down. To counteract this the Government has various new schemes to support lending and investment in small businesses. We also discussed the challenges of recruiting high quality people in all roles. The success of any business rests on the quality of its employees and we need to produce good local talent and have all the other ingredients that help keep that talent local rather than moving away.
I was also delighted to meet 17 year old Apprentice, Tom Preece. Tom attended the local school and is now training to become a Warehouse Manager, working at the same firm his gradfather did. Perhaps more exciting was discovering that he is fantastic cricketer who recently trained at Durham Academy. The future looks bright for Tom.