Dear Customers,
I want to keep you up to date on all things Bradfords.
Delivery Drivers
The national driver shortage has been well publicised in the last few weeks. The good news is that Bradfords are well resourced, and we have increased our capacity, taking delivery of 10 LGV’s in the last couple of months. Our lead times remain at 1-2 days across the branch network.
Supply Chain & Price Increases
There continues to be inflation across our product ranges. This is slowing, especially in timber products, and we continue to challenge our supplier base for justification.
We are well stocked and availability is currently back to April 2021 levels. There are some pinch points – lightweight blocks and chipboard pose the biggest challenge. Please do talk to our teams about alternative options, but as ever, the earlier you can give us your requirements the more chance we have of getting you what you want when you want it.
Autumn Campaign
Our autumn campaign is underway – please look online and in store for more detail.
Awards Season
We have been nominated for Multiple Merchant of the Year and Marketing Campaign of the Year for our ‘Three Cheers for 250 Years’ campaign in the Builders’ Merchant Journal Industry Awards. This set of awards is always the one we care most about because the winners are decided entirely by the votes cast by peers, customers, and suppliers. If you think we deserve recognition, we would be grateful for your vote which you can submit here: Your Vote 2021 | BMJ Industry Awards.
In the meantime, it was an absolute pleasure to hand out the awards and trophies at the delayed final of our Bradfords Community Cup at Exeter Chiefs’ ground this weekend. Seeing such engagement with grass roots team sports in our community justified our support of this initiative for under-8s. We’ll be launching the next season of this programme on 17th October: do let your local junior rugby clubs know to join in and let’s make the 2021-22 event the biggest yet.
Thanks as ever for your custom, and as always, if you have any feedback which you want to share please do send it to our head of communications, Giles Bradford. We continuously strive to improve our service, so any constructive feedback is most welcome.
Yours sincerely,
David Young,
CEO