Marwood Group harnesses in-house manufacturing and innovation to deliver bespoke solutions for an evolving construction industry
With over 55 years’ experience in non-mechanical products, Marwood Group Ltd (Marwood) combines extensive industry knowledge with a comprehensive range of high-quality hire products and ancillary services. Over the last 15 years, the company has invested significantly in its own steel and plastics manufacturing facilities, offering greater control over quality, durability, and innovation. Through Railtec Engineering, Marwood provides bespoke steel design, manufacture, and servicing, supported by in-house CAD and engineering expertise, while the group’s plastics facility, Europalite, manufactures a durable range of barriers and traffic demarcation products.
With 18 national depots and manufacturing sites across the country, Marwood is well-positioned to support projects across the UK, from standard non-mechanical hire requirements to complex, bespoke solutions. We sit down with Andrew Piggott, Marwood’s Managing Director, to learn more about the company’s five-year investment programme, which is driving advancements in its fleet and infrastructure modernisation, vertical integration, and product development.
“We’re really lucky that we haven’t got to rely on outside funding. As an independent, non-mechanical plant specialist, modernisation is more of a migration to newer equipment,” Andrew explains. “When I first started at Marwood, for instance, we were known for our concrete skips; now, with the development of concrete pumping, they’ve fallen out of widespread favour. Today, we always hold large stocks of bulk items for our customers. That means that if a new product comes to market or we develop one ourselves, we can respond quickly.
“Being able to offer our facilities to our customers is a nice feather in our cap, but we do go out to our manufacturers and provide services for their own direct customers. We build lots of products for the school market and external moulding contracts with Europalite, for example. It means that when the construction facility is quiet, we’re able to operate in other areas.”
This flexibility is particularly valuable when customers come to Marwood with requirements that fall outside the scope of its standard product range. The company’s ability to design, adapt, and manufacture solutions in-house means it can respond to individual challenges with practical, tailored products, rather than relying solely on off-the-shelf options.
“On the metal side, we can respond to bespoke requests from customers,” Andrew elaborates. “We once built some forklift man cages for a large amusement park in collaboration with their health and safety executive after they had an incident onsite. It was completely outside of what regulations would’ve normally advised, but they identified it as the best option for them. For another of our customers in Scotland, we redesigned one of our skips and now offer a safer bale arm; we designed, tested, and manufactured that solution in house in the UK.”
These examples demonstrate how Marwood’s in-house expertise extends beyond responding to individual customer requests, allowing the business to identify wider opportunities for product development and innovation. By drawing on its understanding of the market, as well as its ability to design, test, and manufacture products internally, the company can develop solutions that address changing customer requirements quickly while also responding to broader industry challenges.
Marwood’s newly developed eucalyptus timber matting is a great example of this approach. Designed as a more sustainable and cost-effective alternative to the African hardwoods traditionally used in the UK, the new matting aims to provide sufficient performance for the majority of applications without compromising on durability or value.
“In the UK, people have traditionally opted for African hardwoods, which aren’t too sustainable. At the other end of the market, there’s cheaper mats that don’t last at all, so we found a compromise,” Andrew says. “Eucalyptus falls in the middle ground, better than oak and beech but not quite as strong as the African hardwoods, but for 80 per cent of jobs where these hardwoods would’ve been used, the eucalyptus matting will be sufficient for customers’ needs while offering a more sustainable, cost-effective alternative.”
This same forward-thinking approach is also evident in Marwood’s investment in its own facilities and equipment. Alongside developing new products, the company has continued to modernise its operations, replacing ageing machinery and moving towards more efficient technologies to increase capacity and meet growing demand.
“We’ve refreshed our entire forklift fleet to electric forklifts and even replaced some of our earlier electric ones,” Andrew enthuses. “The largest single investment that we’ve made in the last year is within our Europalite factory. We’ve replaced one of the big rotary moulding machines with a new Italian machine to produce our plastic barriers. The machine can produce the two-metre barriers, for which there’s a large demand at the moment, thereby giving us much greater capacity in bringing that product to market.”
Marwood’s ongoing investment programme demonstrates a clear commitment to strengthening the business for the long term, while ensuring it remains responsive to the changing needs of its customers and the wider construction industry. From the continued modernisation of its hire fleet and manufacturing facilities to the development of new products such as eucalyptus timber matting, the group is using its independence and in-house expertise to drive practical innovation. The company’s investment in electric forklifts and new rotary moulding technology at Europalite will further increase efficiency and production capacity, while its steel and plastics capabilities provide the flexibility to develop bespoke solutions when standard products are not enough.
With a strong UK-wide network, extensive industry experience, and greater control over its own manufacturing, Marwood is well-placed to build on its progress and continue delivering high-quality, adaptable solutions for customers. The company isn’t necessarily aiming to be the biggest non-mechanical plant provider out there, but one known for exceptional products and stellar service, every time. With that ambition in mind, it’s committed to building the capacity, capability, and resilience needed to meet the demands of the next generation of projects.
