Member Article

Major contracts fuel rapid growth for lighting design division

The lighting design division at the North East’s leading independent electrical wholesaler, Park Electrical Distributors, has entered 2020 with great confidence backed by strong growth figures.

Over a two year period, 2017-2019, the division doubled its turnover from £6.2 million to £12.6 million.

Park has 82 employees across its six North East branches and a team of eight within its growing lighting design division.

Growth has been stimulated by a raft of major projects, both local and nationally including several projects based at the Newcastle Helix site, with the most recently completed futuristic Catalyst building. The team has also worked on projects at Leeds Beckett creative arts centre, The Lower Mountjoy Centre at Durham University and University of Glasgow.

Park Lighting Design offers a full package of services including lighting design, lighting control and the supply, coordination, logistics and problem solving that make up the modern project. The service is delivered through its in-house team of eight engineers.

In line with its growth, it has recently appointed junior lighting engineer, Josh Brownless, from Hylton Castle, Sunderland and new people are set to join the team throughout the year.

Established in 1990 and recognised as the largest independent electrical wholesaler in the North East, Park has specialist divisions in lighting design and supply and building technologies. With a £30 million turnover, the company has its headquarters on the Team Valley Industrial Estate, Gateshead with branches in Middlesbrough, Newcastle, Sunderland, Durham and Cramlington.

Paul Watson, technical lighting design manager, said: “We are growing at a fast pace and delivering large, exciting contracts, thanks to the contacts we have developed both with the end customer and within our industry supply chain.

“While there has been political and economic uncertainty during the last two years, we have single-mindedly concentrated on our growth strategy and have supported a significant number of regional projects which, in itself, is a sign that there is a great deal of high quality development taking place in the North East.

“As we grow, we are also looking to invest in our team by identifying and developing young talent, we have a great blend of experience and youth within our teams to help continue to drive us forward.”

The Park lighting design division specialises in bespoke solutions based on LED Lighting, which offer many advantages over conventional lamps. For example, LED provides a life of up to 80,000 hours compared to 20,000 for conventional lamps. Unlike fluorescent lights, LEDs do not contain mercury so don’t require special cycling or disposal procedures. This is reflected in a reduced WEEE charge for LED lights. Older technologies such as HP sodium cannot be dimmed or switched quickly and fluorescent has a warm-up time requirement. LED can be switched and dimmed very easily and the lights only need be on when required. Typical savings of 70% can be achieved here.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Park Electrical Distributors .