Fast-growing floor specialist collapses into administration

A floor specialist that has worked with major contractors including Buckingham Group and Sir Robert McAlpine has collapsed into administration.

Malin Industrial Concrete Floors Ltd, a £25.6m-turnover company specialising in flooring production, appointed Mazars as administrators this week.

The Manchester-based firm had a strong profile of work producing specialised flooring, particularly for warehouses. It mainly worked with laser screed flooring, which involves machines trimming concrete slabs into exact floor slabs before lowering them into the ground.

Repeated calls to the contractor for comment were unanswered.

In its most recent accounts, for the year to 31 March 2021, Malin’s turnover fell to £25.6m compared with £38.4m the year before. But its pre-tax profit soared from £109,900 to around £1.3m – nearly a 13-fold increase.

The company also expanded its average workforce from 31 to 50 full-time staff. Demand for warehouses soared over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, mainly due to the boost in online shopping.

But Malin also suffered during the pandemic as its sites closed during lockdown. Despite this, the 2021 accounts filing said the firm had a “strong cash reserve” and expected to return to pre-pandemic turnover levels and see a strong profit margin.

A spokesperson for Mazars said that it is pursuing the potential sale of Malin and its assets, but declined to comment further.

Administrations of construction firms soared last year as they battled with inflation, increased material costs and labour shortages. In November, 34 firms entered administration – more than any month since the onset of the pandemic.

Although the number of administrations slipped in January, DRS Bond Management managing director Chris Davies said that January was a “strange time” because many firms normally postpone December payments until January.

He warned that the tempo of winding-up petitions is likely to increase in the coming months, due to the rising number of firms subject to county court judgements over £5,000, adding: “I can only see the trend [for administrations] remaining at the rate it was last year, if not higher.”

Sir Robert McAlpine declined to comment.

Construction News approached Buckingham Group for comment.