Full speed ahead for Grimsby firm as Morissons' contract creates new jobs

We have been appointed a main contractor on the new Morrisons fish processing plant at the Europarc Business Park which has launched a recruitment programme which could well continue through the summer.

We have been awarded the key project management and principal contractor role to work with Morrisons seafood division, this has already lead to the appointment of four additional technical staff to its project team with more likely to join in the next few weeks.

With the dust having just been cleared from the former Kwok plant, a team of specialist design engineers are working all out to have the factory operational later this year.

Director and project manager, Kevin Stanham, said: “We have a team of people working on site at Europarc and in our head office on the South Humberside Industrial Estate making sure we meet our pretty tight deadlines.

“Our in-house engineers are among the best in the region but we knew we would have to increase our manpower to fulfil our biggest contract to date. Recruitment has begun in earnest and is likely to continue as the workload increases over the next few months.

“The technical team will be eight-strong at least with another 10 to 15 employed on trades and potentially many more within our sub-contractor network. Once the plant is operational, the Morrisons’ workforce is expected to be in excess of 200 but until we reach that stage, another 30 to 40 new jobs could be created”.

Howard Sims, managing director of Morrisons seafood division, is working closely with the Intelect team. He said: “This is a very exciting project for Morrisons, our suppliers and the local economy and we hope to have the plant up and running by late Autumn.

“Intelect were able to provide the experience and skills we need to create a state-of-the-art seafood processing plant and the work has got off to an excellent start. As the main contractor, they will manage absolutely everything that happens on site.

“We already have plans for further expansion of the business and we hope to have Intelect as our partner throughout this period of growth. We also feel it is important to appoint a company from the Grimsby area, so that we could offer some good news for the local economy and for job prospects”.

Kev Stanham has already visited a number of specialist equipment manufacturers in Iceland, Denmark and in the UK to locate the very latest machinery for the new factory. He said: “We have a completion date in mind but for the time being this is between Howard and ourselves”.