Think of a small town in Kent with a name like Paddock Wood, and your average man on the street could be forgiven for summoning up images of rosy summers and idyllic village life in the Garden of England.
But along with this image, the name has always been synonymous with fresh produce. Cast your mind back several years ago, and Paddock Wood was certainly up there with the great fresh produce hubs of the UK - Spalding, Evesham, Lee Valley, Cambridgeshire, among many others - if not heading up the pack.
And while today’s Paddock Wood may not be the bustling hub it was 20 years ago, there remains a core base of companies located there that insist the trading estate still has an essential role to play in the UK’s fresh produce industry.
So how did the area come to be affiliated so closely with the produce sector? “Paddock Wood became a produce hub because of the railway line that goes through it,” says Chris Mack of Mack Multiples, the largest arm of UK produce giant Fresca and the single biggest company trading out of the estate.
“Mack was one of the first importers to come here in the 1960s, when we used to be located where Paddock Wood’s Waitrose branch now stands. We set ourselves up there because of the old railway sidings; in those days, a lot of Spanish and Italian product used to arrive by rail in ambient conditions. Transfesa, the Spanish railway company, built a terminal in Paddock Wood at the time, which remained here until it burnt down two years ago. At the time, Kent seemed a natural location for an estate like this, because it was, and still is, very much the Garden of England.”
But there is no denying that although still a busy hub, the make-up of companies in Paddock Wood has changed substantially over the years. Lots of Spanish firms that set up home on the estate in the 1970s and 1980s have now either gone out of business or upped sticks and relocated, because fresh produce no longer comes in by rail.
In 1989, Mack Multiples considered relocating from Paddock Wood, but according to Mack it was the local staff and their loyalty to the company that convinced the firm to stay put and simply build better premises on the estate. “The South East is still a logical place for a fruit importer to be based,” he says. “We are near the ports of Dover, Folkestone, Sheerness, Tilbury and even Portsmouth, and are conveniently situated on the London-Dover/Folkestone railway line. We decided to keep our options open, as we thought that if the Eurotunnel took off we would be in a great geographical position.”
While some of the firms that have left Paddock Wood over the years have now set themselves up at port locations, Mack believes there is really no cost advantage to such a move. “Land at a port is much dearer, and then a company is rather tied down to deliveries coming in to that port. At Mack, we have learnt that holding product in the right conditions and under close supervision is the key to success, rather than sitting on a port quayside somewhere.”
Indeed, it does seem that Paddock Wood’s location has kept it a popular choice for plenty of companies over the years. The area offers an undeniably solid infrastructure, with excellent motorway links to London and a hard-to-beat location adjacent to Paddock Wood station - less than an hour by train to and from Charing Cross, London Bridge or Waterloo East - offering short travel time to both visit and welcome clients from the capital. But it is not just the old school keeping the estate alive - new firms are setting themselves up on Paddock Wood’s ground too.
Begoña Granja Otero, procurement manager at Fortuna Frutos (UK), explains how Fortuna moved its whole base to the estate in 2001, following the merger of two firms, Frutos Canarias and Fortuna Frutos. “We moved from Dartford to Paddock Wood because this location offered us more office space and optimum travel links. We are just 15 minutes away from the M20 here and the ports of Dover and Folkestone are also very nearby,” she says.
RW Simpson Transport Ltd, a Sheffield-based haulier specialising in fresh produce, has operated out of Paddock Wood for three and a half years now, along with its other sites in Peterborough and at the Port of Sheerness - further proof that companies who have not traditionally been based in the area have recently had their eyes opened to its logistical advantages.
Richard Lee, general manager of RW Simpson’s Paddock Wood operation, says: “Paddock Wood is a natural hive of activity for fresh produce - it is near all the major Kent growing and packing activities and also has accessible links to the channel, as well as being near the Port of Sheerness.” RW Simpson operates 35,000sqft of coldstores and 35,000sqft of ambient storage on the site, with around 30 vehicles coming in - and a further 30 going out - every day.
And there is still plenty of investment being poured into the area. Top-fruit specialist Norman Collett moved to its brand new premises in June 2006 from its old location at nearby Unit W on Transfesa Road. “We have increased from a 22,000sqft site to a 44,000sqft building and a coldstorage capacity of 1,000 pallets,” says technical manager Sarah Calcutt. “In October, our busiest month, we have 360,000 cases of fruit passing through here, and about 20 lorries in and 22 out every day.”
“We now have a lot more office space and meeting rooms, and the technical and commercial guys all sit together, which is much easier - at Unit W we were separated, and flow of information was not so easy. We also have a new IT network with a full high-speed connection, which makes a huge difference.”
Moving to new premises has not only made Norman Collett a more efficient operation, but has also impacted on the way the company does business. “Outside the peak UK apple season, we now offer contract storage to other fresh produce firms; this is something we have only been able to implement since moving to our new premises,” says Calcutt.
All fruit from Norman Collett growers is quality tested at the premises to centrally rationalise product - a set-up Calcutt believes has been invaluable in monitoring individual grower packhouses and keeping them up to date on supermarket tolerances. “We have an excellent working relationship with our growers and packers; people who take great pride in producing the highest quality fruit. Quality service level data for the Colletts group is the best that it has ever been; we are providing the highest levels of service for both our customers and growers,” she says.
A staff restructure in 2006 opened up new roles for staff, with the recruitment of Dean Tunbridge to manage the key Tesco account, and the addition of a new technical manager position to better manage communication with key customers and the general public. An additional quality manager role has just been created to allow a greater focus on growers’ needs and the development of variety trial work.
For a company like Norman Collett, it is sheer common sense to be based in Paddock Wood, explains Calcutt. “We are situated right in the middle of our grower hub here, and have companies around us like ICA and Progressive Labelling, who are integral to the smooth running of our operation and offer us key services. The infrastructure at Paddock Wood is excellent, but it also has the advantage that everyone in the industry knows the area and if you are located here, clients can always find you.
“From our perspective, being situated in Paddock Wood just works; essentially, if you deal with UK fruit, you have to be in Kent. Top-fruit growers are very supportive of each other and share plenty of info, perhaps more so than growers in other produce categories do, and the strange weather we are having has made it necessary to liaise closely with one another - so being here has proven very advantageous recently.”
Norman Collett is now looking to grow the business, building on the key relationships it has already successfully forged with customers and also looking for a bigger slice of the market pie. “We are involved in lots of variety trials, on organic fruit and also conventional varieties like bi-coloured Rubens and Modi,” explains Calcutt. “Our previous trials have looked at varieties such as Cameo, which is now a successful commercial variety available to Tesco customers.
“We also have plenty of plans in the pipeline for new packaging solutions, and are working closely with a local PR company called Naked Vine to promote English produce; Naked Vine had never worked with fresh produce before, but came in with a great new viewpoint and working concept. It is important that we support our customers with new concepts and ideas, and we are always looking for the next, great way of displaying our fruit to the best advantage.”
Supporting the local Paddock Wood community is extremely important to Norman Collett, with the company regularly present at local and county events like the Kent Show, and also sponsoring the local football team with a float at the town carnival, held earlier this month.
Calcutt believes that the firm has never been in a stronger position than it is right now. “We have a great environment to work in and these new premises have offered a different perception to outsiders of the way the company operates. In one fell swoop, we are taking on more and more responsibility and creating jobs that demand greater levels of attention. Capacity building is the key to the future,” she adds.
Another relative newcomer to Paddock Wood is International Controlled Atmosphere (ICA), which has been based at its site in Paddock Wood, next door to the brand-new Norman Collett offices, for three years. The firm was previously based in nearby Tonbridge. “ICA is 100 years old, but this is a new building,” says managing director Andrew Wills, whose firm was responsible for constructing Norman Collett’s coldstorage chambers.
“We serve most of the fruit companies in Paddock Wood with coldstorage solutions, but there are fewer and fewer fresh produce firms here now and more industrial businesses,” he says. “Paddock Wood is a reasonably thriving hub, although not to the extent it was 10-15 years ago; but I do not think this is anything to do with the area itself. Companies are on the look-out for newer buildings, which explains why some have moved out over the years.”
But for a firm like ICA, the move made perfect sense. The company serves a multitude of customers within a five-mile radius and, according to Wills, the hub’s proximity to good motorway links and towns like Tunbridge Wells and London is invaluable. “Since the opening of the Channel Tunnel there has been a better flow of lorries carrying fruit and veg from the continent,” he says.
“There are certainly advantages in being based here. In terms of using Norman Collett’s building as a showpiece for our coldstorage solutions, this is the best position we could have chosen. We can manufacture all our systems here and source everything locally.”
ICA operates offices in other countries - India, China, the US, Hungary and Iran - as well as having agents at its South African production sites.
With companies like Norman Collett and Mack keenly supporting the local community, the future for the Paddock Wood trading estate and the town itself seems bright. Most of Mack Multiples’s employees actually live in the Paddock Wood area, and Mack explains to FPJ how it is growing as a dormitory town. “The population has expanded, and we are the largest single employer in the area,” he says. “It is important for us to be involved with the local community - for example, we provided fruit for the Paddock Wood carnival the other weekend and every year we support a charity, often a local one. This year we have chosen Bower Grove School, an establishment for youngsters with learning or behavioural difficulties, to which we have donated £18,000 for laptops.
“Our employees nominate the annual charity, and by and large they are becoming more project and target-based charities, offering a good incentive for our staff to help raise the money. Recently, we funded the installation of an incubator at the local hospital, where many of our staff were born and/or gave birth, so that was a very personal project for many.
“At the end of the day, people are rather parochial, and that means that areas like Paddock Wood have a longstanding association with fresh produce which will continue long into the future,” adds Mack.
PACKING IN THE PADDOCK
Mack Multiples, which accounts for half of Fresca’s turnover, has always been based at Paddock Wood, operating from one major building and other nearby coldstorage facilities.
“Despite the single-roof set up of this company, Mack Multiples is in fact split up into self-contained business units by product,” says the company’s Chris Mack. “Each unit has its own team and operates as a separate profit centre.”
Within the one building is a 45,000sqft packhouse with a 2,400 racked-pallet coldstorage capacity and a 25,000sqft loading and unloading floor space. Overall, including a separate banana unit and another coldstore and drystore building, Mack uses 180,000sqft of operational area.
The principal building was constructed in three phases. “This is as big a packhouse as we want,” says Mack. “We have become more efficient over the years and can push through more volume now. It’s a large packhouse but we try to achieve continuity of labour on the lines, with a nucleus of people doing one particular thing. We dress people on the lines according to what supermarket they are packing for, which started off as a bit of window dressing but now really helps hammer home to them the function they are fulfilling.”
Mack sources all its labour from one agency, which has an on-site office. “Up until four years ago we used a number of agencies, but decided to scrap that. Now we use one for the packhouse staff and one for our banana business. Over the years we have seen the origins of the labour change, and today a lot of staff come from eastern Europe.”
Mack ripens bananas, stonefruit and avocados at its site.
Mack opened a high-care facility at the site in Easter this year. “We had a large business for grape snack packs, but they were not officially ready to eat. Marks & Spencer asked for product that was truly ready to eat, so we invested £250,000 in this new facility for ready-to-eat grapes, cherries and cherry tomatoes,” says Mack. “The staff working here have had to receive extra training to meet requirements, but it is a worthwhile investment.”
Mack still owns surplus land at Paddock Wood, and has now joined the Kent Wildlife Trust, which will advise on the best way to conserve land. The firm also supports Project Bumblebee, a joint venture between Syngenta and Sainsbury’s to help save some of the UK’s rare bumblebee species.
TURNAROUND IN FORTUNA
Fortuna Frutos is a tomato specialist, operating its own production in Tenerife and the Canary Islands. “We also handle imports from Poland, Spain and Holland,” says procurement manager Begoña Granja Otero. “We trade salads, citrus, peppers and cucumbers too - altogether more than 100 lines, with the majority of volumes going through in October to June, when we don’t clash with UK production.”
Fortuna Frutos’s production stretches across 2,000 hectares on Tenerife, the Canary Islands and Las Palmas, producing around 10 million boxes of tomatoes a year and 2m cucumbers per season. The firm sells 40 per cent of its produce in the UK from its Paddock Wood site, and the rest from its base in Rotterdam to mainland European clients. “Our business used to be all tomatoes, but that has changed and now 50 per cent is accounted for by other lines,” says Otero.
Fortuna Frutos supplies both supermarket and foodservice clients, although the latter constitutes the largest part of its business. “We are consolidating our transport deliveries and cross-docking more at origin, so that deliveries can be taken straight to one place. We are looking at our carbon footprint and having to make deliveries and timings more efficient as a result,” says Otero.
Fortuna’s foodservice programmes are all arranged by contract, and the continuity of performance is what ensures business is booming, says Otero. “It is all about trust. We have trebled our foodservice business in the last five years.”
Fortuna Frutos is involved in various variety research programmes, she adds. “We are boosting our investment and changing our grower structures to allow more for the impact of unusual weather conditions in Spain.”
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