About Us - Slatted Screen Fencing

About Us

Youve made it this far through our website, maybe you found us while searching Google, saw our products on Pinterest or Instagram or another social platform led you here, but who is the team behind this amazing website? And how did this all start?

For over 15 years we have been in the landscaping industry, starting out just in our local area, working from a home office (spare bedroom with a desk and computer) with just a small van, to building a very well respected and highly skilled team, with a much bigger van! That mainly installed higher end composite decking, stainless steel balustrading and cedar fencing.

This got us noticed online, as some of our before and after pictures had been seen on the internet and people were enquiring about our fencing from outside of our local area, this was the start of a new direction for us. The decking and fencing business continued, but alongside it we started building our beautiful panels and sending them to clients nationwide.

We mainly sold our products on a very well-known auction site or through our own landscaping website and a small commercial unit was leased to grow this side of the business. Within our first year we had outgrown our unit and had to move to larger premises to keep up with demand for our products, which as well as being bought direct by homeowners, we were now selling to other landscapers, garden designers and builders. This was another turning point for our business and we decided to fully focus on the fencing and leave the decking behind, this was a very hard decision to make, but not one that we have come to regret.

2001 Start of the Journey

The journey starts around 2001/2002 when Dave starts his own landscaping business, a big step after working for someone else for many years. Over the next 12 years he learns the pro’s and con’s of what’s involved in running his own business.

The business mainly focused on the installation of decking and fencing, a lot of which where the slatted type which over time kept growing and he notices that there is a gap in the market for the supply of these type of slatted panels.

2014 First Commercial Unit

November of this year and we invest in our first small commercial unit, not much bigger than a double garage but it was somewhere to store and build our panels, which we start selling on a well known online auction site, all while still working the landscaping business.

The new unit had a small storage area, a tiny little office and above the office was our build area, we even manage to squeeze in a display section on our wall, talk about making the most of your work space. We continue in this unit for around 18 months until we are desperate for larger premises, as the slatted fencing panels were now a large percentage of the business and was growing fast.

2016 Bigger Unit

We secure a lease on a much bigger unit, this place is huge in comparison to our little unit, we move in and set up our new reception and workshop.

At this point we are fulfilling orders through the popular online auction site, as well as setting up our own website selling our products, due to this the landscaping side of the business has taken a back seat, as we are now fully focused on the supply and installation of the slatted fencing.

2017 Growth

Throughout the year we keep up the momentum and grow the business and in the July we are approached and asked to donate some of our panels, as well as our time to assist in a charity garden at RHS Tatton Park, this proves to be very good for us as the designers and builders of this garden win a gold medal, BBC Gardeners World cover Tatton Park and one of the shows is presented from this gold medal winning garden, with our panels proudly on display in the background.

2018 Ecommerce Takeover

Business is still growing, our online store is doing fantastic and we no longer need to sell on the auction site. We are now supplying to both retail clients all over the country, as well as a steadily growing number of trade clients such as landscapers, garden designers etc, one of these being Marshalls Paving Ltd who purchase our cedar to use on their trade display garden at RHS Chelsea, this is a huge boost to the business as it showcases the beautiful cedar and again puts our products in front of a wide audience who visit the show.

2019 Outgrowing

After almost three years in this unit and we are now at a stage where we are bursting at the seams, it’s looking like it’s time for an upgrade.

2019 Bigger Unit

We secure a lease on a large commercial unit, this place is huge and almost three times the size of our previous and we move in and set up in the July of this year. This is to be our new base of operations for the forceable future.

2020 Flood

February gave us a kick in the teeth, after being in the new warehouse/workshop for only 7 months storms batter the UK and cause huge floods in parts of the country, our area being one that was hit pretty hard and the unit gets flooded, causing thousands of pounds in damage and taking weeks to clean up and recover.

2020 Recovery

But we do recover and after the clean up, we re-paint, plaster, lay carpets etc. and restock.

Next to hit is Coronavirus which we all know, locks down the country.

Once the dust settles a little and we process what this means as a business, we learn what is needed to keep safe, we adapt our working practices and environment and luckily, because we are in manufacturing we are able to continue to work, doing so in such as way that everyone has there own workspace, following strict guidelines and keeping within our family bubbles and luckily everyone stays safe and well throughout this period.

2020 Adela Joins

Adela makes the huge jump to leave retail and work alongside Dave, bringing with her a vast wealth of knowledge from her years of experience, a degree in Human Resources and various other lessons learned from years of training courses, etc.

Working in retail at such a high level had meant being based in London for days at a time, as well as travelling to various countries around Europe, this all sounds great, but all things that the pandemic brought to a halt, as well as changing the face of the high street is forever.

Working close to home, for her own business at this time never sounded like a better option, all she had to do was not kill Dave in the process, as working and living together can be tricky.

2022 Now

Just over two years of working together and we are please to say Dave is still alive and well, Adela has refrained from killing him off, in fact the business has grown from strength to strength over the last two years.

We have increased staff levels, with additional team members in both the workshop side for builds and the warehouse side for picking and packing orders, one of these being Adela’s dad who helps on the picking and packing and also oversees the receiving & unloading of deliveries and collections.

We have also increased our office staff to handle the growth in calls and emails, one of these is Alisha, the eldest of Dave & Adela’s daughters, so when we say we’re a family run business we REALLY mean it!

And because we have a little more room in this unit than our first tiny, little one, we also increased our stock levels, we currently hold well over a million pounds in stock, in a variety of profiles and timbers.

We also have great feedback and online reviews, as well as an amazing following on social media.

Slatted Screen Fencing Today

Fast forward to today, we have moved again to larger premises, our staffing and team has grown to suit the needs of the business, taking on some very skilled people, as well as growing the skills of those who are still here from those earlier days.

We now sell our wide range of high quality, sustainable timbers, fence panels, gates and other related products, to a huge range of clients, from homeowners, trade clients, such as landscapers, builders, and garden designers, to big names in the landscaping industry, such as Marshalls who used some of our products at their show garden at RHS Chelsea. We regularly have had our products used by designers on multiple award-winning show gardens, at places such as RHS Tatton Park, RHS Chelsea, RHS Hampton Court and others, as well as work with architects to assist with their designs and drawings.

Were still that family run business that started out in that spare bedroom all those years ago. Weve just had to grow and adapt along with the business and learn new skills, to allow us to cope with the demand that a growing business has.

I still run all the big decisions past my wife, this is not to second guess myself, but I value her honest opinion and her feedback. She looks at things with an outside perspective and asks honest questions, to why it would be done that way. She usually wins and the relevant changes are then made.

The team at Slatted Screen Fencing are also involved in decision making. If its a new product, a new profile size or timber range, then it is discussed, ideas shared, and things tweaked if needed. Listening to my teams input is an invaluable source of information, that helps us provide, both a high service level and high-quality product that has rightly earned us our place in this very competitive market, as well as our well-deserved positive online reviews.

Thank you for visiting us at our online store.