Building Business

Wayne Fletcher, Founder and Director of Austin Fletcher, reflects on the first few years of business and previews a packed schedule for 2024.

You’re now entering your fifth year of business. How’s the journey been so far and what are the aims for 2024?

It’s been very positive and the business has grown year on year. The last two years in particular has seen strong growth and we’ll be celebrating five years as a business in May, which has absolutely flown by! We’ve had the pleasure of working with some great clients and consultants over the last few years, and have plenty of work secured going forward into 2024. The aim is to continue that growth and we are looking to recruit people in the process. Bringing in the right people will be key to continue building the business in a sustainable, stable, and organic manner.

Now you’re approaching a big milestone, are there any important lessons learned or key experiences for you to reflect on?

We’ve had plenty of challenges to face over the last few years. The business only started trading a few months before the Covid pandemic hit which I have spoken about before, and then further global factors such as the war in Ukraine saw material costs fluctuate significantly again which impacted some of our projects. Throw in inflation and the general economic situation in the UK, or the world in general, and you can see there has been some interesting hurdles to navigate, not only as a business but some of which determine or affect how we deliver our services for our clients. That said, we’ve adapted well and worked hard to build the business up to what it is today. I tend to be fairly risk averse and I think being cautious with some of the decisions made early on, particularly in terms of investment, the projects we have taken on, and recruitment, has held us in good stead to a point where we can now make those moves and push forward with more confidence.

Are there any exciting projects currently in the works?

Plenty! Our project on Fargate is about to go out to tender, we are also involved in a number of community projects, some of which I can’t say too much about just yet, but one is the Highfield Adventures community centre which was featured on Calendar news a couple of months ago. They’ve been great to work with and we’re really looking forward to seeing that development making a positive impact in the area. There are a few large residential/domestic developments in the pipeline as well, so we’ve got a good variety of projects in a number of sectors which is leading to an exciting and busy year ahead.