AFTER several torrid trading years when the recession and construction downturn impacted heavily on its performance, south Derry paving and blocks firm Tobermore Concrete Products is firmly back in the black.
According to figures filed at Companies House, in the year to April 2015 the company enjoyed a significant spike in both turnover and profit while it also took on nearly 50 new staff.
Results for the year reveal a pre-tax profit of £4.2m against £3m a year earlier. Gross profit came in at £14.1m (2014: £10.6m). After tax, Tobermore made £3.3m.
It came on a turnover which soared by 27 per cent from £22.7m in 2014 to £28.9m as the construction sector picked up again.
Shareholder funds in the company rose from £45.4m to £48.6m - an increase of 7 per cent.
Staff numbers over the year went from 150 to 192, which in turn saw Tobermore Concrete's wages and salaries bill jump from £4.1m to £5.1m.
The company's two directors - majority shareholder David Henderson (managing director) and William Kirkpatrick - had a total salaries and pensions package for the year of £201,657, which was slightly down on the previous trading period (£204,062).
Founded in 1942 as a sand and gravel business before diversifying into concrete products, it has always been renowned for its charitable giving, and during the year its donations almost tripled to a record £800,000 (up from £300,000 in the previous 12 months).
Tobermore, regarded as one of the north's best-run companies (it is a past winner of the European Quality Award) currently operates from its base in the village which bears its name, as well as at centres in Bangor, Dublin and Cork.
It specialises in the manufacture and supply of block paving, permeable paving, paving flags, steps, kerbs, edging and channels, walling and masonry, retaining walls and eco paving and walling products for the domestic and commercial markets throughout the UK and Ireland.
