Timber firms suffer in floods

Jewson has been forced to close its Doncaster Barnsley Road and Sheffield Harvest Lane branches for brief periods but has been able to re-route customer requirements through its Sheffield Queens Road branch. And, said marketing director Lindsey Walker. “Our Doncaster Bentley Road branch provided 80 tonnes of sandbags to safeguard the town.”

In Doncaster, the flood plain next to Jeld-Wen started to fill up as the river rose but, as product manager Tony Pell said, the factory was not flooded and production was not affected.

“Staff struggled to get to work as the roads were blocked,” he said. “We’re fortunate that we weren’t affected more.”

It was a similar story at BLP UK, also in Doncaster, where drains overflowed and transport was disrupted, but there was little damage to the business. Operations director Bridie Warner-Adsess said: “We didn’t lose any materials or equipment, roads were closed and there was a bit of disruption to deliveries. A couple of employees were evacuated from their homes, but the water is receding.”

PTG Treatments’ facility in Hull, which collects rainwater for use in its treatments, was fortunately extremely busy when the rain came and could use what it collected straightaway without the business flooding.

Managing director Neil Ryan said: “The collecting receptacles can normally cope, but Hull had one-sixth of its annual rainfall in 24 hours.”

Paul Holstead, from Lawcris Panel Products, told TTJ that there had been problems getting loads in and out of its Leeds facility, but that staff and the delivery fleet had been working overtime to ensure that customers were not affected.

Arnold Laver Timberworld reported the same issues, adding that “customers are quite sympathetic” and that it had a number of lorries out on the roads trying to make deliveries.