UK’s first carbon-neutral fulfilment facility secures £3m funding

The carbon-neutral fulfilment and warehouse provider Airbox has secured a £3m investment from the independent asset manager BOOST&Co to expand operations and grow its customer base.

The funding will be used to purchase a new 87,000 sqft warehouse in Leighton Buzzard, which will significantly increase Airbox’s overall storage capacity from 45,000sqft to 222,000 sqft, enabling the firm to support many more customers and brand owners with their fulfilment needs. Additionally, the new facility will create up to 200 new jobs in the local area.

Airbox, based in Hounslow and Harmondsworth, provides warehouse space for e-commerce businesses with a social-first premise; the warehouses themselves contain studios and content creation facilities that clients can use for their social media strategies.

The business also offers a carbon-neutral warehousing solution in the form of its flagship fulfilment centre. Its carbon neutral status is achieved by 200 rooftop solar panels, which enable the site to produce 212.10 kWp of energy, saving 67,000kw and 93.37 tonnes of Co2 a year.

BOOST&Co has chosen to work with Airbox due to its unique proposition, which combines the current high demand for warehouse fulfilment services, with the strategic needs of the ecommerce businesses that it serves. The quality of the firm’s customer base is very strong and its management team has demonstrated its ability to grow the business with a client focus.

BOOST&Co is a leading provider of growth capital for innovative, fast-growing UK SMEs. The independent asset manager offers flexible term loans, covering a wide range of sectors, with a strong track record in technology, media and telecommunications (TMT).

It has funded more than £500m across more than 130 deals to date and provided close to £200m under the government’s CBILS initiative to support SMEs during Covid-19. Jeremy Tan, Co-Founder and CEO at Airbox says, “we are excited about what this funding and the subsequent investment into our warehouse space will do for both our customers and our growing business.

“Our success has been built on a client-first approach and the next steps of our growth plans keep clients at the centre. We believe that our unique approach to fulfilment services targets a particular gap in the market, so expanding and evolving the Airbox business with this funding will be an important part of our growth journey”.

Ryan Sorby, Head of North and Scotland at BOOST&Co says, “I am pleased we are able to support a very innovative and dynamic management team, with an offering that is changing the fulfilment sector.

“Airbox has grown its revenue significantly year on year, without any marketing support, highlighting the demand for its product. Our funding will significantly increase capacity with the new site, enabling management to continue the firm’s impressive growth journey.”

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