Raymond Brown scoop top county business award

A RECENTLY formed division of Ringwood-based Raymond Brown Group iscurrently celebrating its success in this year’s Hampshire BusinessAwards, having scooped the prestigious KPMG Company of the Year Award.

Raymond Brown Minerals & Recycling overcame competition from theinternationally renowned Chewton Glen Hotel and satellite navigationgiants Garmin (Europe) Ltd to win the title for their innovativestrategy and business practice.

Phil Cotton, a partner at KPMG’s south coast office, said: ‘RaymondBrown Minerals & Recycling stood out as the winner for their clearcommercial strategy and business practices, which have the addedbenefit of enhancing and protecting Hampshire’s environment.’

As well as supplying aggregate and materials to the constructionindustry, the Nursling-based company offers sustainable solutions todivert material from landfill and is leading the way with its ‘first ofa kind’ aggregate recycling plant – a £1.4 million cutting-edgefacility that has already diverted some 55,000 tonnes of material fromlandfill this year.

Raymond Brown Minerals & Recycling have also pioneered newtechnology by taking incinerator bottom ash from the county’s threeenergy recovery facilities and processing it into a substituteaggregate. This state-of-the-art facility is set to produce up to75,000 tonnes of aggregate per annum – further reducing the amount ofmaterial sent to landfill.

Kelvin White, managing director of the Raymond Brown Group, said: ‘I amdelighted that our commitment to the industry has been recognized bythe Hampshire Business Awards. This is a fantastic achievement for usand testament to the hard work and dedication of a great team ofpeople.’

Raymond Brown Minerals & Recycling division is only one year oldand represents the strategic amalgamation of four diverse and competingbusinesses that had evolved within the Group over the preceding 10years.

‘The new company structure has achieved the results we hoped for andmore,’ added Mr White. ‘The new clarity of operation has allowed us, injust 12 months, to outstrip the previous year’s combined performance by472%, with the staff team increasing from 114 to 140 in the same periodto support the expansion in activity.’