JCB has won an order worth more than £½ million for a fleet of backhoe loaders made at its World HQ in Staffordshire.
News of the deal from civil engineering, plant hire and haulage specialist Fred Mence (Construction) comes just days after JCB celebrated 60 years of making backhoe loaders - a machine invented by company founder Joseph Cyril Bamford in 1953. More than half a million JCB backhoes have been manufactured since then.
The order is for 10 JCB 3CX Sitemasters and the machines are part of a regular fleet replacement policy that sees all equipment changed within a three-year period, to ensure maximum availability and to deliver the best return on investment.
Director Paul Mence said: “We started out with backhoe loaders well before we had crawler machines. The JCB backhoe loader is in our opinion the most versatile machine on the market, in terms of work capability and also as a medium-size tool carrying platform."
Founded by Managing Director Fred Mence in 1989, the firm is based in Washington, Tyne & Wear, providing a civil engineering service throughout the North East, from Yorkshire to the Scottish Borders. Works include deep drainage, mass concrete structures, road construction, surfacing and hard landscaping for local authorities and major contractors.
JCB backhoe loaders have always played a central role in the firm’s fleet, thanks to their versatility and high utilisation. Though available with skilled operators as part of the firm’s plant hire fleet, the machines are usually employed on the company’s own civil engineering projects.
All of the company’s JCB equipment is supplied by local dealer TC Harrison JCB, with whom Mence has an excellent working relationship. The dealer provides full back-up for the JCB fleet, with the latest 3CX models now benefitting from the addition of JCB’s LiveLink telematic system.