Diamond Facilities Support Group has achieved its ninth consecutive year of growth in turnover.

The firm, which is based on Birmingham Business Park, generated £9.5 million of turnover in the 2018/9 financial year – a £1 million increase on the previous year.

It follows a year that has seen the firm launch three businesses to form the Diamond Facilities Support Group in a bid to provide more than 90 per cent of services from in-house personnel, creating 60 new jobs currently, with plans for further growth.

These include fire and security maintenance and compliance through Sanctuary Fire & Security Limited; commercial cleaning, pest control and grounds maintenance through Nationwide Property Clean, and specialist drainage solutions via Jet Through Limited.

The Group has landed more than a dozen contracts this year with high-profile names such as Ryder, Mitchell & Butlers, Yates and AFI taking the Group’s client base into the mid-30s.

Adam Atkins, joint managing director of the Diamond Facilities Support Group, said: “We have bold and achievable ambitions for the Group to be more than doubling its turnover by 2022, which will be expedited by the formation of the new businesses.

“Over the years we have built up solid foundations with Diamond Facilities Support as a single entity offering a range of facilities management services, which in turn has allowed us to identify key growth areas and set up dedicated businesses to service these markets.”

Helen Cooper, joint managing director of the Diamond Facilities Support Group added: “Creating an infrastructure where we can offer the majority of our services in-house with a 170+ strong workforce is vital for our long-term growth, because a consistently high level of service will increase the number of referrals that we are receiving and ensure client retention.

“The three new businesses are approaching nearly £1million each to the Group’s overall annual turnover which is really encouraging as we look to grow these three brands across the UK over the next year alongside Diamond Facilities Support.”

The founder of two drainage businesses with multi-million pound turnovers has joined one of the industry’s newest firms, Jet Through Limited, to drive forward the company’s ambitious growth plans.

Greg Beech, who founded and grew UKDN Waterflow into a business achieving £50 million of annual sales before departing in 2014, has joined drainage and cleaning company Jet Through as a corporate development advisor and will be shaping its expansion.

This includes taking the firm’s existing £1 million turnover to around £3 million in the next 18 months with a workforce of ten specialist drainage engineers working across sectors such as retail, care, hotel and leisure, education and commercial property.

Jet Through is part of the Diamond Facilities Support Group of companies, which is also made up of facilities management firm Diamond Facilities Support, Nationwide Property Clean and fire and security maintenance firm Sanctuary – collectively the Group of companies has an annual turnover of £9.5 million.

Jet Through was launched by Adam Atkins and Helen Cooper, the co-managing directors of the Diamond Facilities Support Group of companies, in spring 2018 as part of their vision to have more than 90 per cent of all of the Group’s services delivered by an in-house workforce.

Beech, who also set up and managed a multi-million pound drainage utility business called Direct Drains between 1992 and 2003, said: “The consistent, fast-paced growth of Diamond Facilities Support meant this opportunity was just too good to turn down.

“There is more than £1 billion worth of business to be had in the UK drainage market, and delivering a consistent level of high service in-house will stand Jet Through in good stead.

“Jet Through already has access to a broad range of clients via Diamond Facilities Support’s existing client base, and through using my existing network of contacts and knowledge of growing businesses, I am looking forward to the challenge of helping to take Jet Through to the next level.”

Beech also recently spent two-and-a-half years at Preston-based Service Solutions Group as CEO, and is founder of Surface Medic.

Adam Atkins, joint managing director at the Diamond Facilities Support Group of companies, believes the appointment of Beech is a coup for Jet Through.

He added: “Greg is an experienced professional who knows the drainage industry inside out, so he will be a key asset for Jet Through and the wider group in the future.”

Helen Cooper, joint managing director at the Diamond Facilities Support Group of companies, commented: “Greg’s business accomplishments are also second to none, and he is the perfect candidate to guide Jet Through on its journey of growth, to help drive forward Diamond Facilities Support Group’s ultimate ambition of achieving £25 million turnover by 2025.”

Sometimes a job is not straightforward and where vulnerable people are concerned it can mean a bit of quick thinking and sensitivity to other people’s reactions.

Diamond Facilities Support engineer, Bobby Clarke, discovered this while on a call-out for Hft, a charity supporting people with learning disabilities for whom Diamond provides maintenance services.

It was a Monday night and the staff on duty had called Bobby out to fix a problem. As he was trying to isolate a distribution board, it caused the lights to go out for five seconds. For many people this would be nothing but a quick inconvenience, but for people with learning disabilities it can be unsettling.

Bobby noticed that one of the tenants was particularly distressed by the lights going out, so he took it upon himself to soothe him. Spotting an opportunity to encourage the supported person to get involved, he asked if he would like to be his partner in crime. The tenant immediately said yes and became visibly calmer.

Bobby asked the person if he could count, to which he proudly said that yes, he could count to 2000! So, Bobby encouraged him to count to five while the lights went out, and when he reached five, they would magically reappear!

By this time a number of other tenants had come over to see what was going on, which made the young man feel proud of himself for helping with the job.

Bobby said: “That made me feel I had done a great deed for the day and made sure he felt safe at all times.”

This is a great example of a Diamond engineer stepping in to turn a potentially difficult situation into an opportunity to involve people and make them feel safe. And of course, a member of Hft staff will always be there to advise the best course of action.

Diamond Facilities Support is charging ahead with its expansion plans after striking a deal to service a national powered access company.

The firm is working with AFI-Uplift to maintain their 21 depots across the UK, ranging from Glasgow to Exeter.

The deal is worth seven figures over three-years, and will see Birmingham based Diamond Facilities Support delivering services such as reactive works, mechanical and electrical compliance, fire and security, drainage works and quoted works.

AFI-Uplift will also have access to their own web portal management system to manage the maintenance of each building, complete with access to a 24 hour helpdesk.

Diamond have continued their expansion through 2018 – and will see another year-on-year increase of over 10 per cent in turnover.

Adam Atkins, joint managing director of Diamond Facilities Support, said: “AFI-Uplift has fantastic geographical spread across the country, so this deal is a real coup for us in terms of raising awareness and developing our company further.

“It is especially pleasing to see us winning work by simply approaching them with what we can offer – it became apparent very quickly that they wanted a direct maintenance supplier, which, thanks to our own direct workforce plus our drainage and fire and security businesses, we are able to offer 90 per cent of all work with in-house labour – which is unique within our sector.

“Providing a variety of services in-house is just one part of our focus on service and convenience, as we are also in the process of investing in innovative ways that our clients can engage with us when they need FM assistance.”

Diamond Facilities Support has struck a seven figure, three-year deal to work for one of the UK’s leading pub, bar and restaurant operators.

The business has won a competitive mechanical and electrical maintenance (M&E) tender process to maintain 100 of Mitchells & Butlers’ Midlands-based pubs and restaurants, which include brands such as Miller & Carter, Harvester, Toby Carvery and All Bar One.

The service will see Diamond Facilities Support, along with subsidiary companies Jet Through and Sanctuary Fire & Security, providing a combination of mechanical and electrical compliance, quoted and reactive works.

Adam Atkins, joint managing director at Diamond Facilities Support, said: “We’re extremely proud to add one of the UK’s best-known restaurant, pub and bar brands to strengthen our leisure portfolio.

“Our extensive experience of servicing some of the UK’s best known leisure brands combined with 90 per cent of our services being delivered in-house is helping to make us stand out from the crowd.”

“To come out on top of a competitive tender process for what is a long-term partnership makes this especially rewarding.

Helen Cooper, joint managing director at Diamond Facilities Support, added: “Establishing long-term working relationships with big organisations such as Mitchells & Butlers is key to all of our business’ future growth plans – providing a healthy stream of revenue while also securing word-of-mouth referrals.”

Diamond Facilities Support was formed in 2010, employs over 130 staff and has more than 30 clients with an annual turnover of £9.5 million.