It's no secret that the recession took its toll on the UK building and manufacturing industry.
However, a report conducted by Deloitte has revealed a nine-year high in development across the city of Birmingham, which is also mirrored in reports for Manchester and Leeds.
This is great news for the UK's manufacturing industry, and family run businesses such as Howells Patent Glazing are reaping the benefits of a new wave of UK city development.
The Birmingham Crane Survey showcases the rise in investor desire, new construction and growth of visitors to the UK's ‘Second City' with some very positive results. Confidence in developers seems to have returned, and investors are looking towards cities north of the capital to find higher yielding assets offering better value and continued rental growth.
Birmingham based specialist-manufacturing company Howells Patent Glazing has directly benefited from this new-found investor confidence having consistently increased their turnover year on year since 2014.
Dave Bennett, General Manager at Howells Patent Glazing said: "We are really excited about what's to come for Howells Patent Glazing this year. We have experienced growth on a phenomenal scale, and attribute that to the new wave in positivity from developers. The economic climate is on the up, and we're certainly feeling it here. As a business, we have become more and more aware of a significant growth in the volume of work within our specialist field, especially in cities like Leeds, Birmingham and Manchester. The next big ‘development surge' we are predicting is in Hull - next year's European city of culture."
According to Birmingham Crane Survey, Birmingham is seeing new office construction at its highest level in over 13 years; with over 32% already being let out to aspiring Midlands based businesses. In Manchester, 1.04 million square foot of Grade A office space is under construction, and in Leeds, 865,000 square foot of offices is under construction - the highest level since 2007.
Since 2014, Howells Patent Glazing, based in Birmingham, has experienced rapid growth with record sales and turnover increasing year on year. The increase in Howells's customer demand is believed to be because of increased investment in some of the UK's biggest cities, and their most recent contracts prove that to be true.
