BUILDING & CONSTRUCTION
Businesses that build Argyll
Some of the most impressive businesses in Argyll are powering the construction industry across Scotland and around the globe.
French trains in the south of the country are speeding over a bed of ballast from Glensanda, delivered by sea from Argyll via Bilbao.
Breedon has extended its operations in Argyll with a new asphalt plant.
But construction is not just about the ‘big boys’ who have operations here in Argyll, it is about the small family firms which have seized the opportunity, read the market correctly, invested wisely and grown their businesses over the past decades as demand for construction has increased here in Argyll and the West Highlands.
A perfect example is the incredible story of TSL, which you can read in this supplement – beginning as a sandpit on Mull operated by three family members and has now expanded into an incredibly diverse company, employing 150.
Or father and son team Richard and David Ayling who have expanded their surveying service by introducing the use of aerial surveys by investing in drones and specialist training for David.
Glensanda is one of the most valuable exporters in the Scottish economy and has more than 700 million tonnes in reserve.
Elsewhere around Argyll smaller quarries are prospering as housing demand grows in the Highlands and also by supplying specialist stones and finishes.
Often quarries form parts of bigger construction operations such as in the case of the two quarries owned by MacLeod Construction.
There is just one thing missing from construction in Argyll and that is slate.
This is sad considering that Argyll is home to historic workings at the Slate Islands of Easdale, Seil, Luing and Belnahua, ‘the islands that roofed the world’. Further north at Ballahulish, which was also home to slate quarries, investigations were carried out about a decade ago to see if the workings could reopen.
Slates needed today can be recycled or come all the way from Spain. Will technology or market demand ever make it feasible to reopen slate workings in Argyll again?
Construction is not just about the ‘big boys’ who have operations here in Argyll, it is about the small family firms which have seized the opportunity, read the market correctly, invested wisely and grown their businesses over the past decades