Darwen-headquartered Contract Manufacturing specialists WEC Group have recently announced that they have secured a multi-million pounds contract with Royal Mail. From July 1st 2020, the market leading Engineering & fabrication businesses will start manufacturing all the iconic red letterboxes and associated Royal Mail fabricated metal products which form part of the British heritage.
The 900 staff strong Group recently celebrated its 40th anniversary in business, and WEC now operates from 9 manufacturing sites across Lancashire, Yorkshire, Merseyside and the West Midlands.
WEC Group Commercial Director Wayne Wild said: “The Royal Mail is one of the country’s best-known brands, and we are very proud of our new association with such a long-established business. The new contract is a major boost for our Group’s growth targets. Despite tough market conditions brought about by the recent pandemic, our ability to secure contracts of this scale is the proof that WEC is the “go to” contract manufacturing company for any OEMs looking to strengthen their supply chain and future-proof their business”.
Under the terms of the new contract, WEC will manufacture a wide array of Royal Mail’s fabricated products including (but not limited to) post boxes, parcel drop boxes, sorting stations, and trolleys to name but a few.
WEC Group’s Fabrication Operations Manager Adrian Radcliffe who played a key role in securing this new contract said: “We won this contract based on our commitment to quality and strong track record of delivering similar contracts on time and on budget. This new work fits perfectly with our full in-house manufacturing capabilities which include laser cutting, fabrication, machining, and specialist coatings.
All our team in Darwen are very excited at the prospect to start fabricating such well known products and we will take great pride in turning this into another success for WEC Group.”
Other recent large contracts completed by WEC Group have included the manufacture of assembly jigs for Airbus A320 Assembly line in Hamburg, a multi-million-pound stainless steel bridge in the Lake District, and more recently some key sheet metal assemblies for the VentilatorChallengeUK consortium.
Darwen and Rossendale MP, Jake Berry said: “WEC Group really are a first class company so it’s appropriate that they’ll be manufacturing the iconic red letterboxes right here in Darwen. Well done everyone at WEC on securing this new contract with the Royal Mail.”
WEC Group currently employs over 150 highly skilled welders and has made substantial investments in the latest robotic welding and steel profiling technology over the past few years, improving manufacturing speed, accuracy and repeatability.
The Group has made over £6m of investment throughout the company over the past 18 months. This includes investments in state-of-the-art fiber laser cutting machines, as well as new CNC Machining Centres.
