Copeland Group, a building services company founded by an electrical engineer, is celebrating its 50th anniversary and looking to the future following a management buy-out.
The company was started by the late Tony Copeland and his wife Annice in a mid-terrace house in Stamford Street, Ashton-under-Lyne, with the single aim of providing quality workmanship and client satisfaction as a small electrical contracting company.
Over the five decades since, it has forged an impressive reputation for the quality of its work and staff – many of whom started out with the business as apprentices – and the company has become one of the UK’s foremost providers of mechanical and electrical (M&E) building services.
The company has a vast range of clients that it works with, both directly and with main contractors, such as the NHS and local authorities as well as private health providers, financial institutions and private developers, among others.
Contracts have ranged from projects at public buildings such as hospital, schools and libraries to sports centres, listed buildings, retail establishments and numerous banks.
The MBO announcement in the spring follows the sad passing of Founder, Tony, in September 2023. The restructured board of directors includes Managing Director, Mark Middleton, who is joined by Commercial Director, Aaron Brierley, and Tony’s daughter, Alex Copeland-Anthony, who is Financial Director. They are working alongside Tony’s widow, Annice, who remains a director and shareholder.
Alex comments, “We’re starting as a new team, and we want to continue to build on the success of the business and do my Dad proud – and I think we’re already working together brilliantly.
“Dad always put an emphasis on looking after the employees. He would have sleepless nights over wanting to keep everyone employed and for the business to do well, because there were so many people depending on it.
“He established ways of working that were the reserve of huge corporate structures because that’s what he had learned through his early career; he brought that with him and used it as a template for how he wanted to run his business. We’ve still got those systems in place today to a large degree, which does improve the quality of what you’re doing because you’re doing it systematically.”
The firm started out re-wiring houses for Tameside and Salford Councils before landing a contract to work on the X-ray department at the Manchester Royal Infirmary (MRI), where its teams completed various projects almost continuously for more than 20 years.
As the business grew and contracts multiplied – including its first measured term contract (MTC) with the NHS at Wythenshawe Hospital, where it still works today – it meant a move to larger premises and the establishment of the group’s current headquarters at Nile Street in Ashton under Lyne, Lancashire, in 1984.
MD Mark Middleton, who started with the group as an apprentice electrician in 1986, says, “Tony was very accomplished – an exceptional electrical engineer; he knew almost everything, and it was him who set the standard for quality.
“You can also attribute our success to a vast array of other things – in addition to the established team of loyal staff, we’ve got a great apprenticeship scheme with most of the apprentices staying on when they’re out of their time. It’s a great company to work for, family oriented, and out on site with our clients, we are renowned for quality and never letting clients down.”
The group aims to offer four to six apprenticeships to school leavers aged up to 18 each year, and so far, approximately 160 trainees have gone through the scheme.
Apprentices combine work and day-release at Oldham College and when they emerge as a qualified electrician, they generally go on to a full-time job and are encouraged to progress within the business.
Mark adds, “We’re very proud of the apprenticeship scheme. I came through it, as did our Commercial Director, Aaron, and Paul Ogden, one of our Contracts Managers. It gives people a great opportunity to enter a key industry.”
The group now has a team of around 100 people working for it, with the vast majority of them based out on site.