Sutcliffe . . . now a man in charge of all he surveys

Oct 17 2007 by Alistair Houghton, Liverpool Daily Post

Alistair Houghton meets JOHN SUTCLIFFE, MD of structural engineering specialist Sutcliffe

WHEN John Sutcliffe asked himself whether he wanted to start his own business the answer was clear – why not?

Today his structural engineering specialist, Sutcliffe, which recently moved to the former Why Not? pub in Liverpool city centre, is a leader in its field with projects throughout Merseyside and the North.

Structural engineering still makes up about 60% of Sutcliffe’s business, but the company is increasingly focusing on site investigation and building surveying.

Sutcliffe himself, a veteran of the 1970s Hippy Trail, has seen his business survive a recession and the loss of a major contract and is now determined to make a mark on the city’s regeneration.

“Our plans really are for steady growth,” he said. “Since Liverpool became flavour of the month with Capital of Culture, a lot of the bigger firms are moving into Liverpool to get work so we’ve got to up our game in terms of the service we provide.

“We also have a very high-quality and motivated staff with a low staff turnover.

“One associate has been here for 19 years, since he was a 17-year-old school leaver. At the moment, we’ve got four people doing Masters degrees.

“We know there’s a skills shortage in the business. One way of getting good staff is to take on young people and train them to be what you want them to be.”

Sutcliffe’s turnover rose 25% last year to £2.5m and the company has grown to employ 40 people. Clients include Matalan and Liverpool’s new Print Hotel.

Sutcliffe started his eponymous business in May 1985 after he was made redundant from his job as a consulting engineer.

He set up an office in the back room of another company in Rodney Street and began building his business.

“I don’t think I’ve ever been one of life’s greatest employees,” he said.

By the late 80s, it had 25 staff before recession bit and the company had to refocus quickly.

Sutcliffe said: “We had typical growing pains, when you grow very quickly and suddenly realise you’re charging what you were when you were very small though your overheads have grown quite a lot.”

By the Millennium, a large proportion of Sutcliffe’s business was working on domestic properties for Royal Sun Alliance. But four years ago, RSA decided to take all its work in-house, hitting Sutcliffe hard.

“Our turnover went down by 30% – gradually rather than bang overnight,” Sutcliffe said.

“We refocused the business at that stage. We had to think what else we could do to replace the turnover. We were doing some surveying so we decided to come back to that.”

Sutcliffe’s structural engineer-ing business ranges from office blocks to schools and Housing Market Renewal projects in south Liverpool, Anfield and Huyton. It is working on two new hotel projects in Liverpool.

Its expertise also includes infrastructure work from investigating drainage to assessing flood risk.

Its surveying work includes party wall and topographic work, while its site investigation work focuses on environmental issues such as decontaminating land.

Sutcliffe next hopes to expand his company’s health and safety work.