James Jones & Sons Ltd

We wish all of our industry partners, customers and suppliers a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Tom Coates, Area Supply Manager, attended the Confor UK Policy Conference titled ‘Green Growth Through Forestry and Wood’ last week at the QEII Centre in Westminster. The event was attended by the Nature Minister responsible for Forestry, Mary Creagh MP, who spoke about industry green growth, consultation on land use and the establishment of a new Tree Planting Taskforce. The Timber in Construction Roadmap was acknowledged and there will be more news in the New Year. Other speakers included Ross Hampton from the International Sustainable Forestry Coalition and Paul Brannan, author of ‘Timber! How Wood Can Help Save The World From Climate Change’. James Jones & Sons sponsored the provision of 120 books that were signed by Paul and issued to the delegates to spread the positive message of more timber in the built environment. One of the key takeaways from the day was that the forestry and wood products industry needs to be better at engaging and delivering the positive message we have to tell to a wider audience. https://bit.ly/4gs3lmb

James Jones & Sons has recently partnered with well-known social media influencers – The Restoration Couple, to provide timber for an extensive barn restoration project. The Restoration Couple started with Jo and Tim back in 2010, who have since renovated a large Victorian house, converted a campervan, built a workshop and amassed over 200,000 subscribers on YouTube in the process. The couple first approached James Jones & Sons as they were keen to make a feature of our JJI-Joists and to showcase the benefits of engineering timbers for construction. They were also keen to demonstrate how JJI-Joists work well with natural and recycled insulation material. The first video of the JJI-Joists arriving and being installed on site can be viewed here – https://bit.ly/3DaiBFH

Bookings are now open to join our South Scotland Member Network at James Jones & Sons Ltd' sawmill in Lockerbie for this event that will explore decarbonising timber transport. 📅 23 January 2025 ⌚ 12:30 - 15:00 Decarbonising forest haulage is no longer an option. Join our South Scotland Member Network for this event to hear the results of the first year of Scotland's pilot trial of the electric vehicle for timber transport, including a demonstration of the vehicle itself and the chance to hear from the fleet managers' experiences of implementation. There will also be an update on some of the other developments being trialled in the UK. Speakers from Scottish Forestry, James Jones & Sons Ltd, Kronospan UK and Creel Maritime. Find out more and book a place: https://lnkd.in/eMsJBPj9

A senior team of MSPs from the Scottish Labour Party visited James Jones & Sons flagship sawmill facility at Lockerbie on Friday. The visitors included Anas Sarwar, Leader of the Party, Daniel Johnson and Colin Smyth, who were given a tour of the site by David Leslie, Joint Managing Director, Stuart Roberts, Finance Director and General Managers, Rob MacKenna and Neil Cowan. Our guests were also given a presentation on the Group, which spans operations in sawmilling, pallet manufacture and engineered timber production across the United Kingdom and Australia. Discussions during this visit centred around business support for the sector, timber security, rural employment and the benefit of trees and timber as a sustainable product and one of the best mitigation measures in combatting climate change. The visit was a good introduction and will allow further discussions on a wide range of subjects relating to the industry. https://bit.ly/3Z3XV9J

It was great to catch up with our NBG partners this week at the annual National Buying Group Conference.

Great to visit the construction of the new James Jones & Sons Ltd sawmill at Durham along with the local Member of Parliament Mary Foy. Very impressed with the wooden roof joists made from engineered timber (glulam) manufactured in Germany by Marketing HASSLACHER Gruppe The new mill will produce twice as much sawn timber per minute as the existing mill that is on the same site.

Our team all set up and ready to take part in the Jewson landscaping event in Birmingham earlier this week.

Our team at Durham were delighted to host a visit from Mary Kelly Foy, MP, earlier today. Mary is the MP for the City of Durham constituency, where our new mill is located and she was instrumental in the planning process. The visit was also attended by Paul Brannen, who was revisiting to see the installation of the glulam beams. We took the opportunity to discuss issues around employment in the local area, sustainable supply of timber and the benefits that our product provides in contributing to net zero and timber security in the UK. As well as the progress being made, Mary was very impressed by the fact that she will have the UK’s most state of the art sawmill located in her constituency. https://bit.ly/3CE32G1

James Jones & Sons' new Durham sawmill is progressing well and last week the Glulam beams and purlins were installed. Below is a snapshot summary of the development so far.