Alistair Houghton meets RICHARD KIMPTON, managing director of Kimpton Building Services

HIS company specialises in masking noise – but now Richard Kimpton says it’s time for Kimpton Building Services to make some noise of its own.

Mr Kimpton’s Bromborough-based business started life as a central heating installer, but today carries out complex installations of heating, electrical and air conditioning systems for clients across the UK.

Mr Kimpton led a management buyout of the company in 2003 and has seen it diversify into new areas.

Today, it also specialises in acoustic engineering – masking sounds produced by equipment such as generators or electrical transformers – and in renewable technology.

Now Mr Kimpton is keen for the company to win still more high-value projects to complement its existing work and help turnover soar by 50% by 2015.

“We’ve just done a huge retrofit cooling system for Saint Gobain, in Runcorn,” he said.

“There was a huge furnace that hadn’t been turned off for 10 years. There was a once-in-a-decade shutdown, and we had to re-pipe the cooling system.

“It was,” he smiled, “a bit more complex than putting a radiator on a wall. It would be fantastic if we can get more of that style of work.

“We won’t cut ties with what’s our bread and butter. But I think we sometimes undersell ourselves.

“We are trying to look for a more industrial client base.

“Our renewables knowledge will be of interest to those clients. They want to reduce their CO² footprint.

“Those kind of big projects used to be just about the budget. But now they’re also about brownie points.”

Kimpton was founded in 1963 by Mr Kimpton’s father, Eric, to serve the growing domestic central heating market.

Mr Kimpton said: “My father worked as an engineer for a local company, then thought he’d have a go on his own, and founded this company. But, after 10 years or so, he realised that a lot of other people had moved onto the patch – people who weren’t as well qualified.

“With him having training in other areas, including mechanical services and ventilation, he was able to diversify into those areas, rather than just being central heating only.”

Kimpton became focused on industrial and commercial clients, and after a decade in business added a service and maintenance arm which thrives to this day.

Mr Kimpton said: “After 10 years of being in business, we tended to find that people were replacing the stuff we’d installed, or want it repairing. It made sense to have a service and maintenance entity.

“That used to be called Queensway Services – it was set up as a separate entity by my father.

“But it just became cumbersome trading as two different businesses, so we branded it as Kimpton to coincide with our move to this site 11 years ago.”