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Brush firm looks east to drum up business
A COMPANY is hoping to brush off the credit crunch by cleaning up in China.
Cottam Brush is one of South Tyneside's most successful companies, employing dozens of workers and recently boosting its sales by nine per cent, to almost 3m.
Although the company has continued to prosper since moving last year from Sunderland to Monkton Business Park North in Hebburn, its managing director, Ben Cottam, is keen to explore foreign markets as the UK's economic downturn starts to bite.
Mr Cottam recently joined a trade delegation to China and returned home highly impressed with the Chinese way of doing business.
As a result, the company is hoping to establish trading links with the Chinese city of Langfang, outside Beijing.
Mr Cottam, who heads the 150-year-old family brush business, said: "What impressed me about the Chinese business community was the emphasis placed on personal relationships.
"There is a high concentration of oil and gas business in Langfang, and we are considering working through an agent in the area.
"We can be quite rigid in our business affairs in the West, and I liked the flowing nature of how things are done in China.
"I would hope we can be working through a company in Langfang and seeking work by the first quarter of next year.
"It is early days, but I believe there is an opportunity in China for business growth."
With a population of almost four million people, the city of Langfang is noted for its IT industries, the area having been dubbed China's Silicon Valley.
Cottam Brush made three workers redundant in October to cut costs and currently employs 32 staff.
The company makes a range of industrial and specialist brushes, including supplying artillery cleaners for the Ministry of Defence, and it exports a third of what it produces.
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Weather for South Shields
Thursday 24 May 2012
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