2023 has marked a significant milestone for us as we celebrate the 20-year anniversary of our managing director Colin Davidson joining the Craddys team! 🎉
Starting as an associate in January 2003, Colin became a director and shareowner in 2004, and then managing director in 2017.
The past 20 years have seen so many positive changes and so much growth at Craddys, driven by a huge focus on development and promoting from within. We are very proud of the fact that four of the five directors on the board with Colin, and seven of our twelve associates joined the business as graduates, trained, qualified and now form the backbone of the consultancy.
Some of our other highlights of the past 20 years include:
· Increasing the Craddys team from 12 to 69
· Moving our Bristol Head Office to an office with double the capacity.
· Opening new offices in Exeter, Wakefield and Cardiff.
· Increasing our turnover from £0.7m in 2003 to £5.6m in 2023
· Focusing on developing and promoting from within – our current team includes 39 graduates who joined us within a year of graduating from their respective universities.
· Supporting 18 of our current team members through chartership, with several others beginning their chartership journey this year.
· Developing and focusing on CSR both within and outside of the company, with the creation of a social responsibility committee, training members of our team as Mental Health First Aiders and employing a wellbeing coach.
When Colin began his career at Craddy Pitchers, the first project he worked on was the refurbishment of the Grade 1 listed St Pancras Station trainshed. Since then, he has worked on projects in every sector, from residential to healthcare, education to industrial and retail. Throughout he has retained an interest and specialism in the refurbishment of historic wrought and cast iron structures working on high profile projects in the capital and across the UK. Somewhat of an expert in the refurbishment of Victorian Gasholders.
As well as managing the ever-growing Craddys business, Colin is still very hands-on delivering engineering projects. Colin is currently working on a number of projects, including the construction of a 1.3 million sq ft distribution centre in Leicestershire, and the refurbishment of an 1829 listed gasholder in London, the oldest surviving gasholder in the world!
According to Colin, the past twenty years have “turned out alright”, but this has only been possible by being agile, adaptable and most importantly being surrounded by a highly professional, skilled and focused team of engineers, technicians and support staff.
Congratulations on a very successful 20 years Colin, and here’s to the next 20! 🥂
