IN 1993, a 24-year-old electrician bought a van on a credit union loan and set up a contracting firm which, 15 years later, has established an enviable reputation across the British Isles and is now poised to make its mark in Europe.

That electrician was Mark Scullion, managing director of Premier Electrics, one of Ireland’s most successful electrical contracting companies with an annual turnover of £30m and a dedicated team of almost 60 people.

In the last five years, export levels have grown from virtually nothing to represent 97 per cent of company turnover, thanks to high profile contracts for some of the top names in retailing, leisure and industry across England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland.

More recently, the company has pioneered expansion into Europe by winning major contracts in Romania and Germany. 

Premier’s first German contract was for Primark in Bremen.  In what is described as a “challenging project” by senior contracts manager, Tommy McKenna, the team, mostly from counties Fermanagh and Derry, was selected against stiff opposition for the electrical fit-out of 60,000 square feet of sales space, plus stock and staff areas.

“German electrical regulations are different from ours and we have had to invest considerable time familiarising ourselves with them,” said Mr McKenna. “As well as that, were given 10 weeks to complete instead of the usual 16 for this size of job.

 “This was new ground for us, so the pre-contract work had to be extensive, but we pride ourselves in being the leading provider of quality, fast-track electrical installation and maintenance services to the biggest names in retail, leisure and industry.”

The Bremen project followed on from an already strong relationship with Primark, through fitting stores in the UK, as well as carrying out electrical work for its sister company, Penney’s, in the South of Ireland.

Premier has also been involved with Primark’s flagship Oxford Street store in central London which opened two years ago and included a new concept in lighting – a versatile LED system capable of emitting any colour from the spectrum at the touch of a button.

Premier Electrics’ company manager, Tony Shivers, said the German contract was testament to the strong working partnership that has developed between Premier and Primark for whom the company has completed electrical contracts in around 70 stores throughout the UK and Ireland, including other flagship locations in Liverpool and Cardiff.

 Mr Shivers also paid tribute to Invest Northern Ireland which provided significant support for the work abroad.

In addition to Primark, other significant clients for Premier in the retail sector have included Marks and Spencer, Debenhams and Asda.

Marks and Spencer has been a high profile name amongst Premier’s list of blue-chip clients and it was with this retailer that the company secured one of its most significant contracts to date – a major electrical fit-out for the M&S flagship store in Colliers Wood, London.

 The 100,000 square foot store is now the largest M&S store in the capital and Premier was contracted to supply state-of-the-art sensor lighting, as well as installing a modern IT, fire alarm and security system throughout the building.

 The team was also involved in a massive refurbishment project at the busy M&S store in Grafton Street, Dublin. This scheme was a phased project carried out over the course of a year and involved employees working in phased 24-hour shifts - and often through the night - as the store continued to trade and customers continued to shop while the work was being carried out around them.

Interestingly, the Premier team also secured the contract for the full design, supply and installation of lighting and security and IT systems for the new Debenhams’ store at the huge Westfield Shopping Centre at White City in London. The shopping centre is Europe’s largest indoor complex, covering 150,000 square metres and equivalent to the size of 30 football pitches.

In addition to the retail projects, Premier Electrics has won substantial contracts for electrical fit-outs for top-rank restaurants, cinemas, hotels and hospitals across the UK and Ireland.  And, as part of a new business strategy, the company was accredited with the ISO9001:2000 quality marquee; the ISO 14001:2004 Environmental marquee and the OHSAS 18001 Health and Safety marquee in 2006. In the past year it has upped its game further by rolling out a brand new corporate identity.

All this is a far cry from the early beginnings when Premier Electrics secured its first job with fashion label Etams, which in turn led to working with the Patton Group who are based in Ballymena.

“They had given me the opportunity to price for some outlets,” said Mark Scullion. “The first big one was for the Disney store in Belfast. We were at the tail-end of a recession back then and things were changing. We had the signs on the vans and they were sitting in Belfast’s Royal Avenue –just where I wanted to be.”

Other jobs soon followed, including a series of contracts with Mivan which had developed a hugely successful ship-fitting division, and contracts with Virgin Megastores in Dublin and Derry.

Today, the outlook is good despite the economic downturn, and the forward-thinking management team at this independent, family-owned company is now making real inroads into getting a firm foothold in Europe. “I would say we are at the top of our market and we have been very fortunate to grow our business on job after job and word-of-mouth and reputation,” added Tony Shivers. “We were very lucky in that we had repeat business, but now, the help of Invest Northern Ireland, we are hoping to develop more contacts in Europe.  The difference between a flight from Belfast to Heathrow or to Amsterdam or Romania is negligible. It’s just a psychological barrier that one must get over.

“It was quite an ordeal to trade in the north and then the south of Ireland because that was effectively going into Europe. That came with difficulties and lessons were learned along the way – but the single most important thing was seeing the challenges, learning from them and just getting on with it.”