F. Ball Celebrates 140 Years
F. Ball and Co. Ltd. is marking 140 years since the company was founded, with plans to celebrate the milestone throughout the year.
With a history stretching back to 1886, F. Ball has become the UK’s leading manufacturer of flooring adhesives and floor preparation products for the contract flooring industry and a British manufacturing success story.
The company initially produced adhesives for shoe repair, but it steadily increased its involvement in developing products for the commercial flooring sector from the 1930s.
Since then, it has been at the forefront of technological developments to help flooring professionals to work to ever more exacting standards, including flooring adhesives with previously unseen combinations of properties and next generation high-performance smoothing compounds.
Product quality and innovation is backed up by industry-leading customer and technical support. The company’s Technical Service Department provides advice on subfloor preparation and floorcovering installation over the phone or by email and online chat. Regional technical representatives conduct site visits, in person, to provide bespoke, on-the-ground advice for complex projects, with coverage that is unmatched in the industry.
F. Ball remains a privately owned, family business to this day, meaning it can retain traditional values of fairness, responsibility and integrity, including having a beneficial role in the community in which it operates.
This includes efforts to manage its environmental impact by reducing its carbon footprint through investing in energy-efficient manufacturing equipment and generating its own electricity supply from renewable sources, as well as introducing recyclable packaging.
The company also aims to give back to contractors through its Ball Rewards customer loyalty initiative, which is free to join and rewards members with cashback each time they purchase F. Ball products, alongside other benefits. Similarly, it provides free training courses at the F. Ball Centre of Excellence at its Staffordshire headquarters. The ‘Floorsight™’ apprenticeship programme, launched recently in partnership with the Flooring Industry Training Association (FITA) and WEBS training, provides career pathways in flooring to help tackle the flooring industry skills gap.
Commenting on the anniversary, F. Ball’s managing director, Darren Kenyon, said: “Reaching 140 years is a significant milestone and testament to steadfast values and commitment to customers and quality. This makes us one of the longest-established companies in the flooring industry.
“To celebrate, we are hosting a series of events throughout the year, including community and employee days as a way of saying thank you to the people who make F. Ball what it is and the community in which we operate. While we celebrate our past, we remain focused on the future, continuing to innovate and invest in the next generation of flooring professionals.”
