About Ford Bros
THE COMPANYFord Bros can provide your organisation with the confidence that the company has been around for a very long time. The experience of the staff in the construction of infrastructure projects have built up long standing relationships with local authorities and many other statutory bodies. These contacts enable us to assist our customers in progressing projects and hitting programme dates. TRANSPORTFord Bros operates a fleet of transport vehicles to service the Civil Engineering, Surfacing and Maintenance operations. Find out more here ... ROOTS The company began to diversify into surfacing dressing work in the 1950's providing an outlet for the clean chippings and in 1961 the limited company of FORD BROS was formed. Development continued with the move into macadam surfacing and then in the early 1960's the company progressed into civil engineering works. During the 1960's and 70's growth was steady if not spectacular, building up a sound reputation for quality work and good customer service. From the beginning of the 1980's there was a change of ownership and with it a drive to grow the company and to capitalise on the reputation already in place. The working area was expanded and the company started taking on larger contracts primarily for housing developers and public bodies. By 1990 the company had shifted into larger infrastructure projects where we took on 'main contractor' status rather than working as subcontractors. The management was strengthened and this stood us in good stead when the CDM regulations were introduced in 1996 and we were required to assume principal contractor status. Today we are well known throughout the South West of England as experienced infrastructure contractors having worked for many of the major housing developers and consortiums. CURRENT CAPABILITIESThe company is currently running with an annual turnover of £16 million and is Constructionline approved for Civil engineering and surfacing up to a value of £4 million pounds per contract Indeed the largest contract we have completed was the Northern Distributor Road at Bridgwater. This work was completed in 2004 and had a total value of £3.5 million. The company has up to 20 civils/groundwork gangs and 10 surfacing/small works units varying in size from 2 man up to 6 or 7 man set ups, along with various subcontractors who we can call on for peak workloads situations. The geographical area we cover is largely the south west of England but we also work up the M4 corridor to Reading and Oxford in the east and north up the M5 as far as Worcester. The majority of our work is carried out with directly employed operatives or with labour subcontractors who have been loyal to us for many years. Our work force is geographically spread out from Taunton through Bristol and up to Swindon, which enables to reach most sites daily within one hours driving time. We can of course reach Cardiff within one hour now with the second severn crossing in place. Over the years we have been able to utilise and programme the recourses of both our civil engineering and surfacing departments to great effect to efficiently achieve completion dates for our clients, as greater control of the key resources leaves you less in the hands of third party subcontractors who my have different priorities. TRAININGWe train our site managers on 5-day Health and Safety courses, our gangers/foremen are currently undertaking 2-day Site Supervisors courses. Training is also provided for working in confined spaces, roads and street works accreditation, and first aid. At present we are working to achieve CSCS accreditation for our operatives (currently 75% have these qualifying cards), and our intention is to have 100% CSCS by the end of 2008. HEALTH & SAFETYOur approach to Health and Safety starts from the top where the MD is also the Safety Director. We have a full time safety manager with a part time assistant and employ Building safety group to carry out safety inspections at monthly intervals on all our sites. We have one full time member of staff dedicated to production of health and safety plans. Method statements are produced on site for specific operations although generic statements can cover many of our operations. The company has a low record of incidents and accidents. No prohibition notices have been served on the company in the last 5 years. OUR APPROACH TO YOUR NEW PROJECT Our general approach to contracting over the years has been based on co-operation rather than confrontation as we thrive on repeat business. We always try to have a constructive approach to problem solving and actively encourage our staff to provide solutions to our clients rather than problems. Our intention is always to approach a project with partnering in mind. With any new project we try to produce a programme at tender stage as this assists to identify problem areas in the construction process. These need to take account of Health and Safety issues, environmental issues, as well as the speedy completion of the works. |
The company was formed in 1946 as the Chelsmcombe Quarry Company based in Cheddar producing limestone aggregates and building stone for the local market.
In the last year we have been carrying out more and more S278 type road improvement schemes as the amount of new build has decreased. 
In respect of a specific project It is our view that the success of a project starts to be determined at Tender stage and the quality of the bid will always reflect the quality of the information supplied in the tender. This does not only apply to the price but also to the ability to plan the project efficiently.
