Pride and perfect progress at Pentre Awel
It is a source of great pride that Shufflebottom Ltd, a home-grown Carmarthenshire-based business, has been awarded the contract to manufacture and deliver the steelwork for our own county of Carmarthenshire’s flagship, multi-million-pound development at Pentre Awel, working with partner, Bouygues UK.
The Pentre Awel project is a bold and ambitious project being delivered by Carmarthenshire County Council that will see the bringing together of life-science, innovation, business, research, community healthcare and modern leisure facilities all at one prime location along Llanelli’s coastline to promote the health, wealth and wellbeing of the community.
It’s a first in terms of scope and size for Wales, spanning an 83-acre site, creating 1,800 jobs and is projected to inject £467 million into the local economy over the next fifteen years. Zone 1 – the first phase of the landmark development being taken forward – benefits from over £90m of total investment.
Bouygues UK, a global leader in the construction industry with its respected portfolio of high-value projects in healthcare, education and housing is the lead contractor, appointed to design and build the Zone 1 development (one of four planned zones) at Pentre Awel, following an extensive tendering process through SW Wales Regional Contractors’ Framework. Shufflebottom Ltd, who has worked with Bouygues UK many times in the past, was subsequently commissioned by Bouygues UK to once again be part of its local supply chain as an official partner and sub-contractor.
It was therefore a source of great satisfaction for Shufflebottom Directors, Wesley Shufflebottom, Alex Shufflebottom and Alec Davies to make a site visit together at the beginning of October to inspect progress to date. The foundations have been laid and the 1,300 tonnes of steelwork we delivered in July as per our remit have already been erected, providing the inner strength for Zone 1 in this ground-breaking development. It was fantastic to see the vision for such a prestigious project becoming a reality and making its mark on the Carmarthenshire skyline.
We are also proud that Shufflebottom shares the same social and sustainability values as Bouygues UK: this project is about more than ‘bricks and mortar’ and has a key focus on social value to ensure significant employment and training opportunities for local people during the construction phases.
With Bouygues UK at the helm, this high-value project also has the commitment to connect and invest with local sub-contractors and suppliers who share the same CSR values to help meet its sustainability goals. This is being played out with us at Shufflebottom purchasing a lot of our steel from long-standing supplier Dyfed Steels, Llanelli – steel stockholders and processors and the largest independent in south Wales, www.dyfedsteels.co.uk. We have also sub-contracted tried and tested Cardiff Steels, who are erecting the steel frames under our wing on site at Pentre Awel www.cardiff steels.co.uk
Like Bouygues UK, we at Shufflebottom understand that the success of a project and its delivery on time and on budget is dependent on the quality of the people in the supply chain. It is an added source of pride therefore that we at Shufflebottom have recently been awarded the accolade of ‘contractor of the month’ not once, but twice, at Pentre Awel.