Building through the Pandemic

Author: Jack Willcocks

Jack Willcocks was managing multiple sites and projects for Burbeck Capital and Burbeck Project Management when Covid-19 restrictions hit in March 2020. Learn how these restrictions impacted his builds and what positives he was able to take away from the experience.

What projects were you working on when the pandemic first hit?

I was overseeing 3 sites across Fulham, Putney and Hammersmith with a combined build cost over £4 million. We were halfway through 2 basement excavations, a house conversion into 5 flats and a private client’s house extension when things start to escalate.

What did you find most challenging?

I thought the biggest challenge would be keeping the sites open. But luckily, we were able to adapt and evolve our health and safety even as the government updated their policies on what seemed like a weekly basis. But the real challenge was getting hold of the raw building materials. As builder merchants shut down and supply chains dried up, materials we have historically relied on day to day suddenly proved very hard to get hold of. We had to work with neighbouring construction sites to sometimes trade what stock we had. To add further frustration, suppliers were not updating their websites quick enough, so what may appear ‘in stock’ with next day delivery would often eventually show up 4-6 weeks later, if you were lucky.

 Frustratingly we had to close one site for 8 long weeks, not due to lack of labour or a Covid break-out but because we simply couldn’t get enough plaster for the job. We even tried online market-places, but materials remained few and far between, often selling for 5 to 6 times their normal price.

Were there any lessons you took away from this time?

I feel you can never over plan a job. This point has never been more true. Luckily we have a large warehouse and going forward we intend to arrange our deliveries way in advance, storing what we need until it’s ready for site. Not only does this overcome any future supply chains issues but it also has the added benefit of speeding the build up.