News

This has been a tough year for many and we empathise with those businesses we know that have not made it to the end. Although this calendar year has probably seen the greatest fluctuations in sales from month to month, the financial performance of Chess was very good.

The overall observation from many outsiders is that the market place is very patchy. For example, with government tightening the budgets, the charity we closely partner with, CBCC, has had to shed about two thirds of its staff. This is a real shame because its overarching purpose is to connect school students with employment.

At Chess we have continued to concentrate on improving systems and servicing customers. Our renovated sales team members all have very practical backgrounds making them more valuable to our clients. Overall we believe our engineering and production staff are better equipped than at any time previously. It is important that we continue in this vein. We are very proud to observe that two foremen and our production manager have come through our apprenticeship programme. And that programme continues today.

The indisputable climax of our year has been the acquisition of JV Engineering. This effectively doubles our size and spreads our geographical base to include Perth. We will not be undertaking “synergies”, the corporate euphemism for cutting staff, but rather encouraging the business to broaden its customer base. JV is a very well established and well-credentialed business and we are very fortunate to be able to include it in the Chess group.

“To all our customers, suppliers and supporters, we wish you an enjoyable break and a prosperous 2017. Your success is our success.”