Imagine how magnified these factors become then, when it’s a business relocating from its current premises to a new site. On top of the time and money that has to be invested in such a move there’s also the all-important issue of minimising the impact on the day-to-day running of the business. Printers need their presses to tick over to make money, but moving machines from one site to another causes inevitable downtime and can put a significant dent in your profits. So given the heartache that it can cause, why bother moving in the first place?
In recent months a number of printers have switched premises and the reasons behind these moves have ranged from the relatively banal “we needed more space”, right through to the rather more exciting “our old factory was bang in the middle of where the 2012 Olympic games is being held.”
Duarte Goncalves, managing director of B1 and B2 commercial firm DXG Media, falls into the former of those two categories. The firm moved to a new 1,100sqm site in Dukinfield, Greater Manchester, after outgrowing its old site in Stockport.
Sound investment
“We were hiring two cabins, which were an eyesore in our car park, and also we had to rent a small unit five minutes from our head office,” explains Goncalves. After totting up the sums he realised that getting a mortgage on a single, larger site would work out cheaper than the amount the firm was paying in rent. Also, owning the freehold of the premises would represent a sound investment for DXG.
While the north-west firm was the master of its own destiny throughout the relocation, other firms have moves thrust upon them. One such was Birmingham-based Lithograve. The printer was subject to a compulsory purchase order forcing it to leave its premises of 20 years as it was situated in the middle of a regeneration area in the city centre. Dave Vickers, joint managing director of the firm, says that after pondering it for a while he he came up with two choices. “Firstly we could take the money and close down the business, which would have been an attractive offer had I been 10 years older. Or secondly, we could recognise the opportunity for a new start and restructure the company to meet today’s pressures.” Lithograve opted for the latter and invested almost £1m in new equipment to fill its new premises.
Like Lithograve, East London-based Capital Group turned an enforced relocation into a positive change. Its Stratford factory was one of 200 business premises that were bulldozed to move to make way for the 500-acre Olympic Park. While many of the businesses in the vicinity received the announcement with hostility, Capital’s managing director David Gill welcomed the plans. “The news of the relocation was exceptionally good for us – I personally saw it as a very positive opportunity for the business. It would generate a great deal of noise throughout the industry as well as increasing Capital’s profile,” he says. He recognised that closing the old factory would give the firm a clean slate, which allowed Capital to create one of the print industry’s most environmentally friendly factories at a waterfront site in Beckton, E6.
Gill says that when it came to scouting around for new sites, the old adage about ‘location, location, location’ was at the forefront of his mind. “For us the most important factor was location. We wanted to retain as many staff as possible to lessen disruption, the impact on our customers and also to maintain continuity. We also required a site that was the right size to accommodate our existing and new machinery. Beckton was offered as a potential site and we felt it was a good match for our requirements.”
The whole process ran relatively quickly and smoothly for Capital but Lithograve’s Vickers was less fortunate. “We spent five years looking for new premises to suit our needs, both in terms of cost and floor space, that were located within Birmingham city centre. As time passed and pressure inevitably started to build we had to become less fussy regarding out requirements.” Fortunately the company eventually found the perfect building for its needs, but as any printer who has undertaken a relocation knows, when you’ve located your dream premises that’s when the hard work really begins.
Staying in touch
First you’ve got the relatively easy bits to deal with – such as sorting out utility bills and notifying relevant parties of your change of address. Then things get slightly harder as you’ve got to inform your customers at an early stage that you are moving.
Whether you choose to pick up the phone and notify customers personally or send out a letter explaining the company’s plan, you need to spell out that the move is a positive one for your business and that it will have no impact whatsoever on the work that you undertake for them.
If, however, the move is going to have an impact on them, it pays to be upfront and honest from the start. DXG’s Goncalves warned his customers in advance that there could be some teething problems as a result of the switch, and he advised them to either place work early or postpone it until after the move had been successfully completed.
However carefully planned your business continuity is, a switch in business premises carries with it the strong possibility that you may lose work for reasons beyond your control. Colourprint UK found this when it moved from a facility in Cardiff, on which the lease was due to expire, to its Pembroke Dock plant in west Wales. “We lost some work that I’d handled for years because we’re not just around the corner,” explains the firm’s managing director Karl Long. Colourprint had to bear this loss as the move was part of a carefully planned business restructure, but for those companies who are heavily reliant on a handful of clients it’s definitely worth speaking to them at the outset about your proposed move to ensure that they stay on board.
A further group of people that need to be ‘on message’ at this stage is your staff. Ideally they should be kept up-to-date with developments throughout the relocation process – Lithograve produced a regular newsletter to inform staff of any new developments, and Capital held regular meetings.
Because few firms manage to relocate within the immediate vicinity, staff will inevitably have to endure some level of upheaval and you need to be fully aware of how far they are prepared to compromise. One print finishing boss recalls how he merged a satellite operation into the company’s head office site about 15 minutes down a motorway from the original site – yet the majority of staff refused to move to the new premises and accepted redundancy pay-outs instead. If you face losing a valued team due to the location of a proposed new site it might be worth weighing up further options, as factories are numerous whereas highly-skilled, experienced operatives are not.
When it comes to relocation you will need to call on the experience of your workforce to make sure that the changeover of work from the old site to the new runs as smoothly as possible, and that any costly overlap in work is kept to a minimum.
The one thing that Capital, DXG, Lithograve and Colourprint all have in common is that they decided to time their moves to new premises with investment in new kit, which helped to reduce downtime.
“Our new print kit was delivered into the new premises to make sure it was all set up and running before we made our final move,” explains Lithograve’s Vickers. “In the meantime we were able to plan for and manage a phased move for the remainder of our equipment, with presses moving in the first week, the finishing department in the second and finally the repro and general offices in week three.”
Colourprint had a similar approach. Presses at the Cardiff site were switched off as the new ones came online in Pembroke, thus avoiding any overlap.
Goncalves also struggled in the early stages of his switch, as his existing B1 six-colour press was down for almost a month. He managed to juggle some work onto the firm’s B2 press and also used a local trade printer on a few jobs, but his advice to relocating firms is to include work disruption in their budgets.
Unforeseen circumstances
From those that have endured a move and lived to tell the tale, the message comes out loud and clear: no matter how organised you are and how well you plan, there is always some unforeseen eventuality lurking in the shadows. Goncalves, for one, knows this all too well. “Just like a house move something always goes wrong, and we encountered a number of problems. In our case, the last owner of the new building left some equipment in the factory, which his advisor was attempting to sell on his behalf. Unfortunately this advisor was useless, so this put us back about three weeks, which has a knock-on effect on budgets, but these are things that you just can’t plan for.”
Moving heavy equipment from one site to another will inevitably be fraught with problems, but the most important thing is how quickly and efficiently you resolve these problems. This is where you will need to fall back on the experience and expertise of your team. If everyone pulls in the same direction and works towards the same goal this will make the process much more stress-free and make your new place feel like ‘home sweet home’ much quicker.
BUSINESS RELOCATION
Checklist
Office relocation and fit-out expert Morgan Lovell has pulled together a step-by-step relocation checklist. For copies visit www.morganlovell.co.uk.
1 Outline your project
• Choose a champion
• Get your stakeholders on board
• Decide what your location priorities are
• Find out which issues matter most to your staff - more space, location, break-out areas, sustainability, the environment
• Think about what you want and need - how much space do you need?
• Set your budget
2 Select your location
• Appoint a commercial property agent to help you manage the process
• Evaluate shortlisted buildings and locations
• Work out what it’s all going to cost
• Take some tax advice
• Negotiate and sign the lease
3 Refine the details
• Work out how you will actually use your space once in the new premises and how you will lay out your existing and new equipment
• Choose what type of fit-out contract to go for
• Agree final costs, dates and specifications
• Sort out insurance - public liability, professional indemnity, contents
• Make arrangements for health and safety
4 Prepare for the move
• Take time to declutter
• Arrange support for after the move - IT, telephones, etc
• Keep any downtime or disruption to a minimum - draw up a disaster recovery plan
• Spread the word - notify suppliers and clients about your change of address
• Co-ordinate any holidays, making sure all key people are available
• Start packing
About a month after you move in there should have been sufficient time for everyone to settle in and for any niggles to surface. This is the perfect time to give feedback to everyone involved in the move and get feedback from staff.
