Established in 1894 in South Shields, J Barbour & Sons Limited, the iconic luxury & lifestyle brand that is known worldwide, still manufactures its classic wax jackets on Bedesway in South Shields.
The 120,000 sq. ft site at Bedesway is a factory and distribution facility for a wide range of footwear, clothing and accessories and employs 150 staff on site and Barbour has made significant investment in its renovation.
This included a requirement to improve the lighting as the existing fittings were unreliable, energy inefficient and provided insufficient illuminance levels.
Barbour UK and Ireland’s Facilities Manager, Andrew Liddle, approached several lighting suppliers to obtain bids for how they would meet these needs. He selected NVC’s proposal based on a range of criteria including cost, delivery timescales and NVC Lighting’s five-year unlimited hours product warranty.
Andrew said: “Not only did NVC’s plan meet my performance and budget requirements, it had gone further and proposed a way of installing the lighting that would reduce the disruption on our round-the-clock operations.”
Electrical contractor Dougal & Railton, who both Andrew and NVC Lighting have worked with on several occasions previously, installed more than 400 Greenland IK10, IP65 rated, non-corrosive, impact and chemical resistant industrial LED luminaires.
The improved lighting has brought many benefits to Barbour and its staff. In the distribution area, improved light levels mean that it is a more pleasant place to work in leading to a happier and more productive environment. Emergency lighting provision is also more effective which means that fire safety requirements are far exceeded now. Also, because the Greenland luminaires are IK10 impact rated, they are more robust than the previous fittings so can be relied on to withstand any accidental impact.
Andrew continues: “Not only do the improved illuminance levels make the working environment look and feel better, it is a major part of our energy saving initiatives and we estimate that the NVC Lighting solution will cut our costs by around 40%.”