The Peterborough Evening Telegraph
Paving firm to create jobs after sales rose in lockdown
Surge of interest in gardening helped company bloom
A paving supplier in Peterborough is creating jobs after sales unexpectedly soared during lockdown with a renewed interest in gardening and home improvements.
Demand for paving stones from Primethorpe Paving, in Werrington Bridge Road, went up by 115 per cent, brick sales rose by 194 per cent while the call for cobbles soared by 500 per cent.
The overall sales spike of 114 per cent saw the business owners working 12 hour shifts, six days a week after the eight staff had been furloughed.
Now the family-run company says it is look to take on an additional three members of staff.
Managing director Gary Brace said: “There are likely to be three extra positions opening up. These will be for a sales and customer service role plus two warehouse roles.”
Mr Brace said the business had been poised for a damaging blow during the Covid lockdown.
He said: “We were initially concerned about going into lockdown across the busiest months of the year for us. The timing for us couldn’t have been worse.
“Or so we thought. It seems obvious now, but with people confined to their homes and forced to cancel summer holidays, there was all of a sudden a huge demand for home and garden-based projects and plenty of budget for people to undertake them. We have never been busier.
“There was a huge surge in national demand and more demand locally too. The team was slowly reintroduced back to full working capacity with only a handful of delayed orders and never by more than 24 hours.”