Best practice celebrated at Brammer Manufacturing Awards

This event, now in its sixth year, had the theme of "Keeping Britain Manufacturing' and was hosted by Sasha Twining, a popular news anchor who has presented high-profile daytime shows for Sky News and the BBC.

The Manufacturing Forum's keynote address was given by Professor Mike Sweeney, Emeritus Professor of Operations Management at Cranfield School of Management, who discussed the role that manufacturing can play in rebalancing the UK economy and how manufacturing leaders can play a key role in delivering this change.

More than 150 delegates attended the Manufacturing Forum - held at Rotherham's Magna Science and Adventure Centre - which focused on the delivery of operational performance improvements through optimised maintenance spares procurement and management. Todd Snelgrove, Global Manager - Value at SKF hosted a session on "Realising the lowest total cost of ownership through strategic procurement' while Sam Folger, Tarmac's Materials Manager, spoke on "A strategic approach to sourcing MRO products and services'. The final speaker of the day was Chris Ditton, Programme Manager at Tata Steel, who delivered a real life case study on optimising the value extracted from MRO stores inventory.

Following the Manufacturing Forum, attention turned to the annual Brammer awards which recognise excellence in product and service innovation, new technology and the need for continuous improvement to help customers improve the performance and competitiveness of their manufacturing operations. The award winners were as follows:

• Sustainable Manufacturing - Kraft Foods
• Increased Production Uptime - Alcoa
• Reduced Maintenance - Diageo
• Outstanding Achievement in Continuous Improvement - Premier Foods

Delegates also had the chance to view Brammer's Mobile Centre of Excellence which features product displays and video demonstrations from many of Brammer's world-class supplier partners, including SKF, NSK, Parker, SMC, Festo, Norgren, Rocol, 3M, Ansell, Roebuck and Kimberley-Clark.

Ian Ritchie, Managing Director of Brammer UK, said: "We were delighted to once again host the Manufacturing Forum and Awards for the sixth consecutive year. The event is always a great opportunity for representatives from the UK's leading manufacturers to share best practice with their industry peers, and we consistently receive feedback from our delegates about how attending this event has helped them to understand how to drive step change in their MRO procurement and management strategies, with real impact on competitiveness and profitability.

"The Brammer awards recognise outstanding achievement and, against a backdrop of an uncertain economy, it is encouraging to be able to celebrate good news stories within UK manufacturing industry. Once again our keynote and forum speakers inspired interesting discussion and debate, and we were honoured to welcome them all, as well as our host Sasha Twining. We once again extend our congratulations to all our nominees and winners."

For more information on the range of products and services available from Brammer, including maintenance spares procurement and management, visit www.brammeruk.com.