Giles, Head of Sustainability

254 years in business creates quite a legacy, but also a responsibility to support and look after the South-West community we call our own.  At Bradfords, this means playing our part in providing opportunity, helping communities to create great places to live, and maintaining the beautiful natural environment in our region.  

Opportunities

As a family business, growing our own talent into future leaders of the business is key.  A well-established entry level apprenticeship programme has delivered numerous success stories and encouraged many local people to join us. Many of those who joined the business by this route have gone on to take part in our internal management development course which we put 12 potential future leaders through each year.  

“To look back and reflect on where I started, to where I am now, makes me hugely proud and thankful to Bradfords…” Zoe Harvey, Sales Advisor

The majority of those who complete this course have subsequently taken on more responsibility, including running their own branches.

As branch manager Luke Ledbury states, “Bradfords gave me my chance.”

Great Places to Live

We’ve been providing building materials from day one.  Supporting the development of high-quality high-performance homes built to last is crucial, and so we work hard with both our suppliers and customers to understand how to ensure that.  Keeping our ear to the ground as regulations evolve is key to maintaining a proposition that serves the needs of our customers, but also means that we’re more than just a materials supermarket.  Identifying, assessing, and providing the latest innovations for construction is key, bolstered by our relationship with the National Self Build and Renovation Centre, and our leadership and dialogue around the future of building materials within the Builders’ Merchants Federation.

For most of the region, people live in houses that are already built. Our domestic retrofit for energy efficiency proposition is helping us to deliver great places to live.  Our knowledge of what is needed for an effective retrofit project was enhanced by our 2023 employee retrofit initiative. Through the scheme, 50 employees had their homes retrofit assessed, helping us understand the materials requirement for the work that will need to be done across some 2.5 million homes in our region, whilst also providing an invaluable service to those employees.

Natural Environment

Dartmoor, the Jurassic Coast, Cornwall: just some of the outstandingly beautiful and diverse natural environments that we’re lucky to live in.  Protection of this landscape is important, and therefore both decarbonisation and waste are core topics within our sustainability strategy.  We work closely with forward-thinking builders to understand what they need to be able to construct with sympathy.  We engage with those manufacturers looking at water management, biodiversity, and low-carbon solutions, whilst also working with the likes of South-West water to support the drive to be more frugal with natural resources.