Wills Gee move into new premises after expansion
A ST NEOTS project management company is reaping the benefits after taking the decision to diversify and expand during the recession. Wills Gee Ltd, founded by Jim Wills in 2006, broadened its services when the recession took hold, and has gone from stren
A ST NEOTS project management company is reaping the benefits after taking the decision to diversify and expand during the recession.
Wills Gee Ltd, founded by Jim Wills in 2006, broadened its services when the recession took hold, and has gone from strength to strength by securing contracts with Tesco, Sainsbury's and Morrisons.
Last week the company moved from Market Square, St Neots, to new premises at Falcon House, Alington Road, St Neots. They were opened by Mayor of St Neots Cllr Gordon Thorpe on Friday.
Wills Gee earned contracts with the supermarket giants, predominantly to manage petrol station refits, after identifying areas that Mr Wills described as "recession-proof".
"When the credit crunch hit, we wanted to target areas that we knew would not suffer as things started dying off - people will always need to run their cars, and people will always need to visit supermarkets," he said.
Mr Wills also took the decision to bring site labour in-house, and run courses in first aid, health and safety and fire training to broaden the range of services offered by the company.
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He said: "The training courses have been an add-on to what we offered before, so that now traditional project management makes up around 50 per cent of our business.
"We were sometimes let down by labour, so we decided to employ our own. That way we knew we could depend on them, and keep our standards up, which is very important."
Wills Gee works with companies across the country, and has a �1m contract with Haig Homes to look after and maintain 5,700 homes for armed forces across the country.
Mr Wills said his company's growth - going from a turnover of �300,000 in its first year, to the current figure of �2.1m - could only have been achieved with a broad national focus. The company is currently working on projects from Glasgow to Tunbridge Wells.
He said: "We are a national company, but we could not have operated only on a local scale. We have had to diversify, but if we had stayed in our local area we would not have survived.
"Having said that, I always try to recruit staff and source suppliers from the local area, as I think it's important that the revenue stays local. If I can buy local, I will.
