Experienced team helps Yorchem progress
The expertise behind North Yorkshire-based family business Earnshaw Limited is being used to help Yorchem, formerly known as Abstract Polymeric, become a successful business in its own right. According to Yorchem, a UK-based firm that supplies chemicals to the global leather market under the trading name of Euro Finishes, its customer base and international reputation have grown because its young management is made up of former Earnshaw staff.
Yorchem managing director, Darren Strafford, believes the knowledge he and other senior figures built up at Earnshaw has helped it carve out a niche for its products. All five of the firm’s principal staff, including Mr Stafford, are former Earnshaw people. The others are production manager Richard Pollard, sales director Julian Osgood, logistics manager Amanda Parsons, and Bolivian-born technical sales manager Freddie Cartagena.
“Earnshaw’s was arguably Britain’s most respected manufacturer of surface coating chemicals, when the name disappeared following the takeover by BTP and its subsequent sale to Clariant,” says Mr Strafford. “Earnshaw’s built its reputation on three core principles; quality products, competitive pricing, and honest and reliable service. It enabled it to successfully export to nearly 80 countries, and that is the yardstick we have set ourselves.”
Established in 2001, Yorchem supplies its leather finishing products to Brazil, Argentina, Italy, France, Israel, China and South Africa. In the last six months, it has appointed distributors in Guatemala, South Africa, Asia and Europe, and is looking to appoint agents in Pakistan, Canada, the US and in other South American countries including Mexico, Columbia, Bolivia and Panama.
The company came about when Mr Strafford, a developmental chemist, identified a need among leather manufacturers for bespoke solutions and higher levels of flexibility in relation to product innovation, development, delivery and cost reductions that many major corporations were unable to offer.
It recently invested heavily in laboratory and production equipment at its 3,000 square-meter plant. Its products include resins, stuccos, acrylic emulsions, binders, penetrators, feel modifiers, filling and matting agents, and oils and waxes.
Mr Osgood said: “Whereas bigger companies offer manufacturers their product list and say take your pick, we talk to manufacturers about what they need and supply the amount they need.”
