Member Article

North East shipping container firm expands

County Durham-based shipping container firm, Parsons Containers, says expansion is on the cards to meet increased demand.

The Sedgefield firm has doubled its container sales in the last two years nad has now increased its workforce to 16.

Parsons operate two main divisions; one hiring and selling containers, and the other offering self storage under the U Hold The Key brand - operating across nine sites.

The company was one of the first businesses in the UK to offer shipping containers for self storage in this way and currently has over 1,000 containers, with about 60% used by the general public and 40% by small businesses.

A third division of Parsons is Container Container, created in 2007 to sell containers via the internet, which was a new development in the market at the time. This arm of the business has grown year on year and given Parsons Containers a national presence.

Founder Ean Parsons said: “Every February between 2000 and 2007, people would start moving house and demand for container self storage would go up. When the usual peak of business didn’t happen in 2008, we knew that there was something seriously amiss in the economy.

“I’m very proud of the way we were able to adapt our business to trade through the recession and in the process build a very successful container sales division.

“At the same time, we continued to develop U Hold The Key and we now have a very strong foundation in the North East, with sites in Tyne and Wear, County Durham and Teesside.

“We’re now starting to see a new upturn in the demand for self storage. With the great platform that we already have and by boosting our workforce, our aim is to grow back into the container hire market and match the growth we have experienced in sales and self-storage.

“Stephen has been an important member of the team for a decade and has built up a wealth of knowledge about the industry. He is well respected by his colleagues and his many other business contacts. Stephen’s promotion to container sales manager is thoroughly deserved and I am sure that he will be very successful in his new role.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Tom Keighley .