Engineered Foam Products, based in Spennymoor, County Durham, designs and manufactures moulded foam and expanded polystyrene solutions for many of the world’s biggest industries.
Their mission is to lead through ideas and innovation, to maximise the potential of their materials and to provide sustainable solutions to customers.
The NEAA catches up with David Vallance CEO, John Cant CSMO and Tim Wilson CTO, to talk about their sustainability goals, business plans for 2023 and how they can support the NEAA membership.
Can you tell us a little bit about Engineered Foam Products, where you are based and the markets you supply?
Engineered Foam Products (EFP) is an award-winning UK based moulded foam manufacturer with over 50 years experience in the business. Our innovation-led approach to maximising the potential of our sustainable materials allows us to serve a diverse range of market sectors including construction, HVAC, pharmaceutical, food, aerospace, horticulture, packaging and of course, automotive.
We have four manufacturing sites strategically located across the UK including our dedicated IATF 16949 accredited automotive facility in Spennymoor and three other manufacturing sites in Livingston, Northampton and Torpoint.
How much of your business is in the automotive sector, and what are the main products you manufacture at the Spennymoor site?
Our manufacturing plant in Spennymoor is a dedicated, IATF 16949 accredited site with 20 years of experience manufacturing millions of high-value, automotive components and returnable dunnage annually. Safety critical components such as bumper cores, crash pads, front, side and luggage spacers, tool trays, steering cowls, seating and returnable dunnage are all manufactured on site for some of the largest OEM and Tier 1 suppliers.
Automotive remains a sector which benefits enormously from the properties of expanded foam including weight saving, energy absorption, material recoverability and sound deadening. These properties assist vehicles in many ways, consisting of between 96-98% air the lightweight nature of expanded foam aids vehicle lightweighting helping to improve fuel/energy efficiency, whilst material recoverability and energy management properties lend themselves to safety aiding in vehicle crash applications and improving resilience to multiple impacts.
As with all businesses over the last few years, EFP has seen the effects of the downturn within the automotive industry due to the pandemic and subsequent recession however, as a resilient business, EFP has managed to diversify during this period into other sectors whilst remaining ready to adapt to changes in the automotive industry when output becomes more normalised.
