Coleman & Company celebrates 50 years of business

After three generations of family management, Birmingham-based demolition experts Coleman & Company celebrate 50 years in business today (October 16th) with continued investment and respectable profit levels.

Managing Director Mark Coleman, the grandson of founders John and Norah Coleman, says the golden milestone is a “massive achievement” for the family business, which had a turnover of £15.5millon last year.

Despite the difficult economic environment investment in people, facilities and equipment has helped Coleman & Company to buck the trend of decline in the construction industry.

Profit margins are increasing and the firm has taken on 40 additional staff in the last 12 months thanks to a string of successful projects. This is in addition to more short-term contracts for locally employed project staff on a number of high-profile projects including demolition works at Birmingham New Street Station. Mark Coleman said: “This milestone is a remarkable achievement for any family business and we are extremely proud to not only to celebrate 50 years in business, but to celebrate it with continued success.

“Revenues have gone up and down in recent years as you would expect with the continued economic uncertainty but our profit performance remains healthy and last year’s margin was our best yet. Some sectors in the construction industry are struggling but others, such as utilities and industrial, are presenting real opportunities and we are well placed to deliver them.

“As the construction industry continues to evolve, we will keep investing in our people and equipment to develop new, innovative methods to reach new sectors and meet changes in customer demand.”


The company was founded in Stechford in 1962 by John and Norah Coleman before their son David took over the helm after John’s death in 1984. David was succeeded as Managing Director by his own son Mark in 2011 and remains Group Chairman of the firm, now based in Great Barr.

Coleman & Company employs 158 people in full time positions with many more in the supply chain working on projects across the UK. It moved to Great Barr in 2006, where it has invested in a purpose-built, six-acre site including the UK’s first urban quarry, a specialist washing plant capable of turning 150,000 tonnes of waste material into recycled sand and gravel each year. This year a further £1.9million has been invested in new plant and equipment, including the formation of a new diamond cutting company.

The firm has completed a string of high-profile projects in recent years including the deconstruction and demolition of Dunston Rocket in Gateshead and sensitive demolition work at Birmingham New Street Station, for which it was awarded World Demolition Contract of the Year in 2011.

This year it also completed the challenging deconstruction of a gas holder for National Grid in Liverpool – another successful project which has been shortlisted for the same award this year.

Mark Coleman adds: “I am extremely proud to be a third generation Coleman working in the family business and delighted to say that the last 50 years have been a great success for Coleman & Company. I sincerely hope that I, and other generations to follow, can build on this and achieve even greater things in the next 50 years.” “This is a true family company, in all senses. Our greatest asset is our people and we want to ensure that as the company progresses we will remain a family business in every way. We may have invested in the latest innovations but without the people that operate, manage, maintain and direct them they are just lumps of metal.” Coleman & Company is celebrating the golden milestone with a year-long charity initiative called Triple 50, aiming to raise £50,000 for three charities; The Sepsis Unit at Good Hope Hospital, SIFA Fireside and Teenage Cancer Trust . It is also working closely with Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council to improve a local nature reserve close to the firm’s Great Barr headquarters.

Mark concludes: “The Coleman & Company family also extends to the communities in which we work, which is why we were so keen to mark the milestone by helping to make a difference for local people.”

A letter from Mark Coleman

Below we have included a letter from Mark Coleman, managing director of Coleman & Company Limited following their success at the World Demolition Awards: Dear all

We are very proud to announce our recent success at the World Demolition awards in Amsterdam last Friday. The complex nature of the work that we carry out in the most demanding environments has now been recognized at a global level. This is just reward for the hard work and effort that everyone here at Coleman’s put’s into their day to day job. It is also recognition of how the construction industry here in the UK leads in design and innovation, without this we would not be able to provide these complex solutions to our respected Clients.

As you might expect nerves were on edge and emotions running high, no names will be mentioned for fear of embarrassing the individuals involved. If you would like to find out more about this please speak to Paul Mayo or Kieran Conaty. Proceedings commenced with a raffle prize, we knew something was slightly unusual about this special evening when all three prizes were collected by Coleman staff, Dave Coleman, Chris Holland & Ed Aslin. This set the scene and indeed the mood for our table for the rest of the evening, I am sure you can imagine?

The Civils Award came up early on in the evenings proceedings shortlisted against Tyne Tees Demolition Ltd and Matte & Associates from India, we felt we had a good chance as our submission was very strong. Sure enough our name was called out as Winners. This project involved the complex dismantling of a live motorway bridge in Maidenhead which spanned over the high speed rail lines into central London. The work had to be carried out in phases each phase would involve the removal of a “slice” of the bridge in a longitudinal direction. Our team were allowed 3.5 hours every Saturday night to remove the deck comprising of concrete and steelwork which could not carry any plant load above 40 tons. Each of the six phases were saw cut from above during the week, lifting points were fixed to each of the slabs with temporary restraints secured. No form of vibration could be used to carry out the work as the soffit of the bridge deck was spalling, falling pieces of concrete onto trains travelling at 100 mph below would not be acceptable! Thirty possessions were required most of which were Saturday nights - the motorway would be closed, heavy craneage rigged (2 nr 500 tonners for the majority with 2 shifts needing a 1000 tonner on top). We would then remove the temporary restraints, protect the track lift the slabs each weighing between 15-20 tonnes, clean the site down and remove the protection. Our temporary works engineer Ed Aslin worked for 18 months full time working on complex Form C’s and Lifting Plans deserves special recognition.

A few categories later…..our next shortlisting“ The Explosive Demolition Award “. This time our work in Greenock Scotland was under the spotlight, this high rise tower block demolished for our Client River Clyde Homes not only had all of the usual issues for an explosive demolition. Namely specialist structural engineering, pre-weakening of the structure, drilling for explosive charges, at source / secondary / remote protection and the management organisation to include all liaison to evacuate of 500 people. This blow down next to the main rail line into Glasgow, posed an array of risks and issues which had to be resolved by the project team. Working closely with the Ian Wharton from RVA Consulting and Network Rail we ensured that we satisfied Network Rails concerns and complied with their stringent requirements. To achieve this all parties agreed that a night time blow down was the safest time to implode the structure, this itself posed a whole host of other problems. All evacuees were out of their homes for the evening, put up in local hotels, the area within the 15000m2 exclusion zone had to be illuminated and manned to maintain security and control of the zone. Once the rail possession were handed over to our possession manager, track protection was installed whilst Network Rail isolated the overhead power lines. In the early hours of the morning the structure was successfully imploded without any damage or disruption.



The judges decided that in this category we would be "Highly Commended" with the explosive award going to Fabio Bruno of Brazil.

Well done to Mark Carless, Paul Mayo and their team for making this look so easy, I think having worked on some 30 or more combined blow downs has something to do with it!!

Then finally the penultimate award “The Contract of the Year Award”. This category is always the most fiercely fought in any construction industry award event, the World Demolition Awards were no different. With some 40 projects entering from all around the world by all of the major players from every continent, only something special would win. There were six shortlisted contractors each with their own unique challenging projects, each having a innovative solution. From the six shortlisted three were acknowledged for special commendation…our name did not figure – the Coleman table was deathly quiet…

The silence did not last for long as our name appeared on the screen and the Dutch TV presenter called out “Coleman & Company” for the 6th time that evening! Our work at Birmingham New Street had now been recognized as world class, this has only been achieved by working closely with our Client the Birmingham Gateway Team - Network Rail & Mace Group, in particular Steve Williams - Network Rail & Daniel Priest - Mace Group. This complex project presented our company with the most challenging problems encountered in our 49 years of trading. The removal of 8000 tons of mass reinforced concrete with beams weighing upto 90 tons each. Removed above the busiest rail station in the UK, below a City Centre shopping centre. All carried out with limited structural information and executed under onerous noise dust and vibration limits. This challenged our team of Structural and Civil Engineers who worked closely with the Birmingham Gateway Team to bring our solution to life…. A bespoke scheme using a crane system for lifting, similar to that in a factory - support for the system came from the structure itself. Modular trusses were used to support the beams being removed, hang beams and slide beams using the limited inherent strength of the structure. All of this work was carried out working on a floor 110mm thick with a point load limit of 1/3rd of a ton. The cranes travelled on rails north south within the building, for removal of the concrete we used specialist diamond cutting techniques. The mezzanine slab was carefully dismantled using the cranes & trusses to support and move the concrete with the wire saws cutting the structure into 10 ton chunks. Slabs were lifted out whole straight onto the back of haulage. To work through all of the engineering challenges and ensure that the project had been de-risked to acceptable level we employed at peak 15 civil / structural / temporary works engineers. This project was delivered to the highest of safety standards and is a credit to all involved particularly Kieran Conaty Project Director, Chris Holland Technical Manager and our Lead Designer Neil Holdsworth. We feel a worthy winner of this extremely prestigious award.

The combination and mix of this work all of which was carried out simultaneously demonstrates what Coleman & Company are capable of.

I look forward to seeing you soon

Mark Coleman
Managing Director
Coleman & Company Limited
Email: mac@coleman-co.com
Tel: 00(44)121 325 2424
Fax: 00(44)121 325 2425

Coleman & Company win two awards

Coleman & Company have won two awards at The Demolition World Summit 2011 which took place on Friday, November 4th in Amsterdram.

The two awards in question are the “Contract of the Year”, for their work on Phase 1 of Birmingham’s New Street Railway Station. The second is a “Civil’s Demolition” award for their work on the A404 Railway Bridge in Maidenhead.

Coleman also received a ‘Special Commendation” for the Explosive Demolition Award for their work at Octavia Court, Glasgow.

Mark Coleman, Managing Director of Coleman & Company said:

“I’m delighted to receive these awards. It’s nice when our team receives recognition for their hard work at such a high profile event. The incredibly complex nature of all three projects highlights how our business has changed and thrived during challenging economic conditions as we move towards our 50th year of trading in 2012.”

We'd like to say congratulations to everyone at Coleman & Company. Also, check back on the site tomorrow when we have a letter from Mark Coleman discussing the awards.

Coleman & Company restructure Board of Directors

Demolition, reclamation, and bulk excavation firm Coleman & Company have just undertaken a 5-year strategic review, and one of the outcomes is a restructuring of their Board of Directors.

According to Mark Coleman, group managing director:

"It is important that Coleman & Company Limited continue to develop the brand and core specialist services that it currently offers, whilst investing in a programme of sustainable development and diversification. Key to this success is the strengthening of the Board structure"

With that in mind, the following changes have been made:

David Coleman, having successfully developed the Company over many years, as is now Group Chairman, overseeing future progress.

Mark Coleman, is now Managing Director, responsible for the delivery of development and strategic plans.

Mark Carless, having successfully worked his way through all aspects of the company, has rightly earned his appointment as Contracts Director.

Lesley Morris, a Chartered Accountant, has been the Company Secretary and Accountant for the last ten years, is now appointed as Finance Director.

Malcolm Garner, a Chartered Accountant with a wealth of experience over 35 years, mainly as a Senior Partner with a top ten firm of accountants, is appointed