Housewares Business-to-business magazine for housewares retailers and their suppliers
This week’s floods left one Sheffield housewares supplier counting the cost – and another counting its blessings.
Oxo Good Grips supplier Helen of Troy is having to move to a new address after the torrent of water “completely wrecked” its premises.
The company is sited next to the River Don, which, after prolonged heavy rain, burst its banks. “We were evacuated from the building and we all managed to get home,” UK marketing manager Tracy Carroll told Housewareslive.net. “But if we’d been there another 10 minutes we’d have been stranded.
“Our building was completely wrecked. My desk is completely sodden, there’s mud all over the floor and all the internal structures have to be completely rebuilt.”
However, supply of Good Grips will not be disrupted. “The best thing is that we don’t hold stock, we have an external distribution centre, so none of our stock’s been affected,” said Carroll. The company has also been able to find alternative premises quickly.
“We managed to get temporary offices and we’re back up and running as of today, and we move into our new offices on Monday,” Carroll said.
The new address is The Quadrant, 99 Parkway Avenue, Parkway Business Park, Sheffield S9 4WG. The company has confirmed that it is retaining its phone number.
Carroll said it would be three to six months before the company could return to its former premises.
Meanwhile, just around the corner, cutlery supplier Amefa escaped the floods by a whisker.
“This was the worst hit area of Sheffield – Brightside,” said managing director Martin Russell. “The water came down the road, but we’ve got a building which is surrounded by a wall and the wall directed the water past us. It was just two or three inches from coming over the top. People were being airlifted off the top of their buildings on the other side of the road.”
While the company avoided the floodwaters, though, they did prevent staff from going anywhere.
“We were paradise island without the paradise!” Russell said. “We were marooned but we were fine because we had wine and pizza. We were stuck here till two in the morning.”
