Meet the Toolmaker event can promote partnership working and strengthen UK manufacturing relationships

Paragon Toolmaking General Manager Kevin Batty says he expects an increased focus to be placed upon the benefits of nurturing UK manufacturing partnerships at this year’s ‘Meet the Toolmaker’ event.

Mr Batty will be in attendance along with business owner Daniel Beaumont at this year’s event, which is being staged at the Manufacturing Technology Centre in Coventry on Thursday, October 21.

Barry Davidson, manufacturing manager from our ‘sister’ company Fairgrieve Compression Moulding, will also be present to showcase the specialist skills of his business, which was also bought by Mr Beaumont in the past 12 months.

Both businesses have benefitted from recent investment and are now exploring ways of working together to improve efficiencies and ensure they help each other stay ahead in competitive markets.

Mr Batty believes the work undertaken in recent months gives them a strong message to share at the forthcoming event, especially given that many UK manufacturers have come to appreciate the value of British-based expertise and service more than ever over the past 18 months.

“We’ve seen a clear shift in the market in that many people who had perhaps looked overseas for toolmaking in recent years have now again started to look in the UK, and that has been driven by a need for reliability” said Mr Batty.

“The reality is the UK market has always been able to offer better quality and certainly a much better offer with regards to customer service, if not always the most competitive price, which will always motivate many decision makers,” said Mr Batty.

“However, many in manufacturing have been hit by unreliability and uncertainty in the wake of Brexit when dealing with overseas suppliers and whilst that has been the case we have taken the opportunity to further strengthen our offering and examine ways to improve the way we work.

“That has seen us place a huge focus on the level of support we can offer customers at every stage, from concept and design, through manufacture and installation and beyond in terms of our on-site support and aftercare.

“We know that there is a desire across the manufacturing industry to source more toolmakers from the UK, where they can access better quality products, faster lead times, benefit from less associated costs and have expertise and knowledge on their doorstep, not thousands of miles away.”

Recently, Paragon Toolmaking launched the ‘Paragon Promise’, guaranteeing customers innovative and industry leading products, true British design and engineering expertise and complete customer support for all installations and servicing.

“We’ve got to push a message that British is best, and that collectively we can work together to improve UK plc,” Mr Batty added.

The ‘Meet the Toolmaker’ event is organised by the Gauge and Tool Makers Association (GTMA) and the British Plastics Federation (BPA). It aims to bring UK plastics moulders face-to-face with tool making specialists in a day designed to help these co-dependent businesses connect.

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