about us
Tarmac, a CRH company, is the UK’s leading sustainable building products and construction solutions business. Our innovative products, services and solutions help to deliver the infrastructure needed to grow the economy today and create a more sustainable built environment to support the future prosperity of the UK economy.
With over 150 years of experience we have a breadth of capability and expertise that covers aggregates (including recycled aggregates), asphalt, readymixed concrete, cement, lime and powders, mortars, screeds, blocks and other building products. Our products are used to build the future, making things better for people, the planet and the UK economy, from building new homes and offices to building schools, hospitals, bridges, roads, clean water and flood defences. Our materials are also used to make other essential products such as steel, paper, glass and drinking water.
In addition, we provide road maintenance and contracting services, surfacing more than 4,800 miles of road in the UK each year, and maintaining a further 13,600 miles of the local road network annually.
Tarmac, a wholly-owned subsidiary of CRH plc, is a national business, operating at 430 strategic units across the UK. We have stewardship of some 100,000 acres of land and employ around 8400 people. Our head office is located in Solihull in the West Midlands.
We provide our products, services and solutions through four distinct business units that operate locally across the UK; our Materials business, providing aggregates, asphalt and readymixed concrete, our Building Products business, our Contracting business and our Cement, Lime & Powders business.
Our Materials business unit offers a wide range of aggregates (including recycled aggregates), asphalt and readymix concrete products. The Materials business is managed across three regions and covers eight local areas which enable us build stronger relationships with our customers and deliver excellent customer service.
Our Building Products business offers a complete range of innovative construction products including lightweight and dense blocks, mortars, screeds, specialist sands, decorative aggregates and packed products.
Our Contracting business is the leading supplier of road surfacing, highways maintenance and infrastructure services in the UK.
We supply a comprehensive range of bulk and packed cement-based solutions for all types of construction projects. Our subsidiary company Sapphire Energy Recovery provides waste-derived fuels and substitute raw materials for cement manufacture.
We are the UK’s leading supplier of high-purity lime, limestone powders and chemical stone. Our Limbux lime products are used across the globe for water purification, and as an essential constituent in the manufacture of iron and steel, as well as a wide range of other applications.
We have continued to grow our business and have maintained our focused growth strategy with a number of strategic investments in 2019. We received the green light to start construction of a new asphalt plant in Birmingham. We were pleased to have secured the marine sand dredging rights for the Bristol Channel, providing a long term natural sand source for our customers in south west England and south Wales for at least the next 15 years. To help provide long term security of our aggregate supply in the south east, we have partnered with London’s fastest growing port, the Port of Tilbury, to create the UK’s largest construction materials aggregates terminal at Tilbury2.
Meanwhile, our new Infrastructure team, part of our Construction business unit, started work, providing continuity and continued delivery of critical highways projects. The team brings together former colleagues from a Carillion joint venture to provide expertise as principal contractor to multi-million-pound projects for ports and harbours, the defence sector and Local Authority infrastructure. Throughout the year the team have been working on several major civil engineering works which are already nearing completion.
We have also continued investment in our most important asset, our people. Training has begun at our new world class training facility, The National Skills and Safety Park, at Nether Langwith Quarry, Nottinghamshire. This will be the hub for Tarmac’s Professional Operator Development Programme and includes classroom facilities, working areas and virtual reality training tools.