Marren Microwave has marked its 35th anniversary with a special celebration in its Northamptonshire head office at the end of last month.
The servicing and installation firm believes it has maintained its position as an independent business thanks to sustained growth and the vision of its MD Bob Clifford.
Business development manager Kelly Barrell commented: “We are very proud of the pace and manner at which Marren has grown.
“One of our customers commented, ‘you are the company that works from the cottage’. Perhaps that’s a reflection on the type of business we are, very customer and staff centric.
“We are proud of our very low staff turnover, with 25% of the workforce with us for 15 years or more and several for over 20 years.”
The company began life in 1985 when Ian Marren established it in a Wollaston, Northamptonshire premises.
Moving to a commercial property in the same village in 1990, the number of engineers and staff increased to over 25 by this point, serving a growing customer base including Tesco, Travellers Fayre, Greene King and Mitchells & Butlers.
A year later, current MD Bob Clifford joined the company to establish the sales team and expand the services department, though at that time he was tasked with selling microwave ovens. He took over the MD role just a year later, however, helping to evolve Marren from a sales business to a service-based company.
By 2000 the team had grown to 50, with over 25 administrative and parts department staff, and therefore moved to a larger premises in Wollaston.
A decade later, Marren bought CES Microcare, a company it had previously sub-contracted in Scotland. The firm’s owner Malcolm Skinner and his employees were all retained by Marren, with Skinner becoming Marren’s operations director in 2011.
Since 2017 Marren has operated from an even larger base in nearby Earls Barton, including the operational teams, a dedicated training facility and its spare parts division.
Today Marren is a company with over 70 employees. It has won several accolades in the last couple of years, including Catering Insight’s own Service & Maintenance Provider of the Year award 2019.
