Shrewsbury based vacuum lifting specialists Danvac is celebrating 10 years in business this year. The company, run by Dan Wheeler, started as a spin-off of Dan’s father Alan’s company, Alan E Wheeler & Son, in 2004, originally trading as Alan E Wheeler & Son – Hire Division. When Alan retired in 2008 Dan purchased the shares in Alan E Wheeler & Son, changing the name to Danvac. Since then, turnover has doubled and the staff has continued to increase, supplying and servicing vacuum lifting equipment for industry throughout the UK.
Dan says: “Despite the recession in the UK manufacturing industry, Danvac has continued to grow and thrive, and we have some exciting expansion plans for the future. Our equipment can be designed and manufactured to lift anything from an egg to a 20 tonne piece of steel, and everything in between, using various sizes & shapes of suction pad, enabling our customers to automate difficult lifting jobs whilst also making the workplace safer and more efficient.”
One of the industries in which vacuum lifting is particularly beneficial is wood processing and furniture manufacture, where the product is not particularly heavy but does need handling & manipulating in a safe and damage-free way. Dan continues, “Two of our biggest customers are Egger UK and Kronospan, and we supply many different types of suction pad & cups for use on short cycle presses in their manufacturing plants. These machines run constantly and for this reason Danvac hold stocks for these, and many other companies, on the shelf ready for same day delivery if required so that production downtime is kept to an absolute minimum.
As well as designing and marketing our own range of vacuum lifting equipment, our biggest potential growth area is in spare parts and consumables. We are the sole UK distributor for Eurotech GmbH, a German manufacturer of OEM equivalent parts for all makes and models of vacuum lifting devices and automatic pick & place stacking gantries. This means we can supply consumables, off the shelf, and save you money against your traditional supplier.
Considerable R & D investment also means our consumables are better engineered than many other components, and our non-vulcanised rubber seals means a more environmentally friendly disposal at the end of their working life”
Danvac moved to Shrewsbury’s Centurion Business Park in June 2013 and plan to increase their workforce, creating new employment opportunities for engineers in Shrewsbury over the next twelve months.
