Shackerley Employees Celebrate Royal Honour

Deputy Lieutenant of Lancashire Mr Rodney Swarbrick CBE DL made a special visit to Shackerley to present the Euxton manufacturing and distribution firm with a Queen’s Award for Enterprise.

The entire Shackerley workforce turned out to see the Deputy Lieutenant, in his capacity as a representative of Her Majesty the Queen in Lancashire, present company founder and Chief Executive Brian Newell with the royal accolade. Representing Chorley Borough Council, Deputy Mayor, Councillor Terry Brown, was also in attendance to congratulate the directors and employees on their success.

Shackerley, a supplier of ceramics and specialist products and services to the construction market was one of only 40 businesses to receive a Queen’s Award for Enterprise in the Innovation category this year. The prestigious honour was in recognition of Sureclad, a new rainscreen cladding system for the exterior of buildings, which Shackerley has developed, trialled, perfected, patented and successfully established in the UK construction market over the past five years.

A delighted Brian Newell said he was ‘absolutely thrilled’ to receive the Queen’s Award, which he accepted on behalf of everyone at Shackerley. He said: ‘I want to thank every single member of the Shackerley team, in every department, for the commitment they have shown in making Sureclad a success story. Developing and nurturing our rainscreen business to the size it is today and achieving recognition at the highest level has definitely been a team effort. Every employee can take pride in the fact that they have made a valuable contribution.”

The Sureclad system was deemed particularly innovative because of the way it has allowed architects to use ceramic granite, an exceptionally versatile and attractive high performance construction material on the outside of buildings in ‘ventilated’ rainscreen systems. Shackerley’s sleek and beautiful rainscreen facades, which have no visible fixings, thanks to a patented undercut anchoring system, have already transformed the appearance of many high profile developments across England, Scotland and Wales. The Sureclad system also provides valuable protection from the elements and allows for effective thermal and acoustic insulation to be installed between the building shell and the ceramic granite outer façade.

This is the second time that Shackerley’s successful innovations have been recognised with a Queen’s Award for Enterprise. The company’s first Award, granted in 2002, was for Framelight, a simple timber based and mortar-free method of creating glass block partitions and features in the home, which was instrumental in opening up the DIY market for these fashionable building materials.