Record CAB members see the bigger picture

Chief Executive’s Comments – December 2009

I heard an accountant on Radio 4 recently proclaim that the recession was now over and things would continue to get worse. Hardly positive stuff, although technically it is backed by statistics. The Construction Products Association state that construction output is estimated to have fallen in the final quarter by 1.1% compared with a fall of 0.8% in the previous quarter. Against this background CAB ran a members-only mini -conference in November entitled ‘Supply Chains – looking ahead’ at the Heritage Motor Centre, Gaydon, Warwickshire. Speakers were drawn from the supply chain management/facade teams of Willmott Dixon, VINCI Construction.

While the economic conditions were fully acknowledged, there was great insight into the forward project plans for all the contractors. It was fascinating to see the ‘work’ that had been done by some of the speakers in advance. One stated that 31% of CAB’s 130 members were currently within their supply chain database – some serious food for thought for some who were present. To encourage an interactive event many questions were forwarded by text and these were often basic in nature but of significant interest –for example how does a CAB member initiate contact, how will they be measured or some idea of contract sizes at the lower end.

It is always difficult to quantify the success of such events but we recorded the highest number of CAB member companies attending a single event – close to 50% of the total UK membership. Encouragingly this was heavily populated by aluminium fabricator members who were certainly as a group more buoyant about 2010 than the industry grapevine might have you believe. We intend to develop such interactive events that are heavy on added value and light on members’ time.

There seems to be so much media comment and rumour about budget cuts at the UK’s leading development and investment opportunity – the Thames Gateway – that it was good to see Sir Terry Farrell outlining its huge potential right up to 2050 at the recent Thames Gateway Forum. As I have said before in this column, sometimes you have to immerse yourself in what is really happening rather than statistics and media hype to really see the bigger picture.