The COVID-19 pandemic and the associated lockdown is continuing to test us all in every aspect of our lives.

When April began, the Sontay factory was closed, the Sontay Academy had cancelled all training and the company was rolling out furloughing of more staff that had been working from home.

Fast forward to the end of the month and the picture has completely changed! 

With the willingness and hard work of our manufacturing team, we re-opened the factory and despatch departments on 20th April.  For the rest of the month, the team worked exceptionally to catch up on orders waiting since we were closed as well as day to day orders coming in. All whilst working with new processes designed to keep them as safe as possible at work. Many products have been manufactured and shipped to projects critical in supporting the current cause. 

The Sontay Academy is renowned for offering industry training and being a BCIA training partner for their popular Building Controls courses.  Unfortunately, the classroom based courses which were already booked up for the coming months had to be cancelled.  With a real hunger in the industry to access training during these difficult times, we worked hard at the Academy to bring a suite of training to our clients. We made a special offer promotion on our E-Learning courses to support businesses looking to access training during these times and created an online version of one our popular CPD’s to offer as a free insight. To complete the offering, we worked with our trainer, Andy Camsell and the BCIA to create online webinar versions of the BCIA courses. The first one took place on the 5th May. All of these initiatives have received a fantastic response.

What a contrast to the beginning of the month where the business was at a standstill. 

The signs are there that the industry is opening up again around the world and we are seeing an increase in order levels and project activity looking to use Sontay products. The beginning of May is so far showing us a very positive picture and something for us to build on.

The experience over recent months has been awakening for many of us and given us the push to try new things, learn new skills and approach things differently.  If we all bring these new attributes along with us for the future, there is a bright new vision ahead.

An enormous thank you to the Sontay team, our customers and clients for the support and understanding they have given us over this exceptional month. We would not be who we are without you!