Summary
• EE Olley & Sons was established in the 1930s.
• It stocks large dimension constructional timber products.
• Its new website has a Hollywood theme.
• It has chain of custody certification.

Timber merchant and importer EE Olley & Sons Ltd has been putting its name up in lights recently.

Its decision to highlight its chain of custody (CoC) credentials, along with its impressive line in speciality constructional timber lead it to launch a new website (www.eeolley.co.uk) with a decidedly tinsel town flavour.

EE Olley has been supplying timber since the 1930s and has built a strong reputation for providing all the special and unusual constructional items that other timber companies don’t keep, from long and wide sections and sheet materials, to telegraph poles, sleepers and specialist tunnelling components.

The company started life in London before moving to the Surrey Docks, where it built up a substantial trade with the packing and cable drum industries. It then moved to its current base in Dartford in the 1970s.

The two-acre site has all the facilities required to cater for a diverse range of materials, including a comprehensive milling facility, large covered sheds and a fully concreted surface.

With over half of all orders collected, yard service is crucial and the company also prides itself on an “excellent collection service”, and delivers across a wide area.

The company is a true family business, with its founders Ted and Alan Olley still involved and with the day-to-day work centring on purchasing, operations and sales, which are looked after by Tim Olley and Mark Jones.

“I’ve been involved for over 33 years and concentrate on purchasing and operations, making sure we’ve got the right materials coming into stock at the right time,” said Tim Olley. “That’s what EE Olley & Sons is renowned for and our customers rely on us to have large quantities available ex stock.”

Speciality stock

The company has built its reputation on holding stocks of unusual items, as Mr Olley went on to explain: “We stock sawn constructional timber up to 300x300mm and lengths up to 8.4m but we can also supply up to 14m long and 600x600mm sections. Many of the items are kiln dried and graded C16 or C24. Round poles up to 200mm and railway sleepers in new softwood or oak as well as reclaimed, are another large part of our trade.”

The packing industry still provides a large element of the company’s business and stocks of popular packing material sections are also held.

Mark Jones, who was formerly with E Jones & Sons, which was sold to the Kingsbury Group, joined EE Olley 10 years ago. “It’s been a great time, building the business up with a strong team with a vast range of experience. Now we hope that, through our new website and also by promoting our chain of custody credentials, we’ll be able to take this success to a higher level.”

Mr Jones sales experience has clearly driven the desire to transform the image of the company and take the message to all of its customers. “We wanted to promote awareness, demonstrate our specialisms and help our merchant customers to see the vast range that we offer, together with our expertise and experience that they can tap into.”

This lead to the ‘Olleywood’ campaign, complete with wooden ‘Olleywood’ signage, wooden stars, clapperboard motifs and all the other pictorials that create a film set-style website. “One of our drivers came up with the name and we took it from there through a design company,” said Mr Jones.

Serious fun

The website is extremely engaging and fun, but it has a very serious purpose; the movie theme is principally designed to set the company apart from the competition. “We wanted to really make sure we’re different and this will put us on the map and hopefully make us quite a talking point,” said Mr Jones.

Chain of custody has become an integral part of most timber businesses and EE Olley & Sons is no exception. “A large percentage of our product is going into construction and, as the larger players increased their demand for CoC, we knew that we needed to ensure we offered a reliable source of products,” said Mr Jones. “This has meant that, with the Soil Association as our accreditation body, we have put together a full FSC and PEFC system, so that our customers can be assured that when they use us, it’ll be done correctly.”

Tim Olley has the task of making all this happen, from the initial purchasing contracts, right through to yard storage and deliveries. “It is another layer of complexity but it has also helped us to improve all of our yard management,” he said. “So there have been some good improvements off the back of our CoC systems.’

With over 70 years trading experience, wide ranging product knowledge, and the stocks to back it all up, EE Olley & Sons looks set to become a new star in its sector. Who knows, if there are timber Oscars out there, we could well see a nomination shortly.