Furnishings manufacturer, The Belfield Group, which includes the brands of Westbridge, Tetrad, Belfield Home & Leisure and Clinchplain, has confirmed that it is consolidating its Westbridge production into a single facility.
Under the plans, Westbridge WB3 factory on Deeside Industrial Estate will move to Westbridge WB2 site in Flint by the end of 2024, with the company expecting to cut 78 jobs.
A statement said: “Westbridge will be consolidating all production into a single site facility, with all work transferring from WB3 into WB2 by the end of 2024. WB2 will become our sole manufacturing facility, retaining significant capacity through our proposed use of shift patterns, although we will still be retaining our WB3 facility, with a view to re-starting operations in this facility in the future when market conditions improve and volume demand returns.
“Westbridge have faced several impacts over the past year that have led to this decision. The uncertainty in consumer confidence combined with supply-chain and inflation pressures created a difficult trading environment in 2024, an environment that has impacted the whole industry. In addition, M&S’s decision to exit the ‘bulky furniture’ market has resulted in us accelerating transformation plans to mitigate the loss of a significant portion of our traditional intake.
“The decision to move to a single manufacturing site allows us to accelerate our ‘factory of the future’ concept providing us solid foundations for growth, whilst rationalising cost to ensure the business can complement its superior design and quality with competitive prices. We believe this additional resilience will ensure the long-term success of our business.
“Westbridge are taking great steps to ensure that there are no impacts to our customers during the transfer of work from WB3 to WB2. We have a Project team assembled, led by a skilled Project Manager and supported on all project meetings by our Exec team and Senior Management team. We are now very experienced at managing the transfer of work between our multi-site facilities, so we are extremely confident we will continue to meet the Westbridge high standards of quality and delivery performance on any transferred product through this period.
“It is our intention to transfer work in stages over the next two months, so we drip feed out of WB3 and drip feed into WB2, ensuring our skilled workforce transfers at the appropriate time alongside all necessary stocks, componentry and customer specific instructions on a customer by customer basis. This step by step approach will ensure that each customer is treated as a stand-alone transfer project, with each subsequent project then beginning once the previous project has been completed and production is running with no impacts.
“In addition to site consolidation at Westbridge, Belfield Group have also announced a further review of headcount within their Belfield Leisure business, ensuring resource is aligned appropriately for the forecast demand in 2025. They have also confirmed that they are proposing to exit the soft furnishing market, with an expected wind-down of operations at their Belfield Home business by 31 January 2025.”
