What we cover
Most commercial schemes need the same set of disciplines: a properly prepared site, sound foundations, reliable drainage, well-built external works and a clean handover to follow-on trades. That's our core business.
A commercial groundworks package from us typically covers:
- Site clearance, demolition liaison and bulk earthworks
- Reduced level dig and formation works
- Foundations, ground beams and reinforced concrete substructure
- Floor slabs, including power-floated finishes
- Drainage — foul, surface water, SuDS and attenuation
- Service ducting and incoming utilities trenching
- Kerbing, drainage gullies and chamber works
- Tarmac and block-paved car parks, service yards and access roads
- Hard landscaping, retaining walls, fencing and bollards
- White-lining and signage civils
We work to NHBC, BREEAM, CDM and adoptable standards depending on the project, and we'll match the level of formality your scheme requires.
Sectors we serve
We've delivered commercial groundworks across a broad range of end uses:
- Offices and business parks
- Schools, nurseries and educational facilities
- Trade counters, builders merchants and retail units
- Light industrial and SME workshop developments
- Veterinary, medical and care facilities
- Equestrian and agricultural-commercial buildings
If your project doesn't fit neatly into our other sector pages — industrial and logistics, renewable energy or data centres — this is the one. The capability is the same; the end use is just different.
Working with developers and main contractors
We're set up to work as the principal contractor on smaller commercial schemes (typically up to around £500k of civils) and as a sub-contracted civils package on larger schemes. We're CIS-registered, fully insured, and our paperwork — RAMS, COSHH, training records, plant maintenance logs — is in order and available on request.
A few things developers and main contractors consistently tell us they value:
- Direct line to the site foreman, not a regional manager three sites away
- Daily site diaries and weekly photo updates as standard
- Honest pricing — no low-ball tenders followed by variation claims
- Plant we own, not hire-and-hope
- Steady, experienced lads — not a different agency crew every week
How we cost commercial work
For tendered work we'll price against the schedule of works, drawings and ground investigation report you provide. For negotiated work we're happy to provide a fixed-price quote, a target cost with pain/gain mechanism, or work on a schedule of rates — whichever fits your procurement preference.
We can also engage at pre-construction stage to flag buildability issues, suggest value engineering and help refine programme assumptions. Free of charge if it leads to a job, on a consultancy basis if it doesn't.
Where we work
We're based in Knaresborough and we work across the whole of North Yorkshire and the surrounding region — Harrogate, York, Leeds, Ripon, Northallerton, Thirsk, Skipton, the Vale of York, the A1(M) corridor and into the Tees Valley.
If you've got a commercial scheme at any stage from outline planning to tender, send the information through. We'll review it properly, ask the right questions, and come back with a quote and a programme.
