With a trading history that spans three centuries, Folkes has been successfully growing it’s commercial real estate division for the past 60 years, firstly on industrial land formerly utilised by its manufacturing subsidiaries and more latterly by land acquisition.
Our team
Meet the Folkes team.
Scott Wheatley
Property Finance Director
Christopher Bartley
General Counsel
Sarah Tromans
Property Manager
Victoria Allen
Marketing Manager
An exceptional range of current tenants:
Our History
Folkes Properties Timeline.
At Folkes Properties, we have a rich history that dates back to 1697 when Folkes Holdings was first established. Building on the rich engineering heritage of the group, we seized the opportunity to capitalise on our physical asset base in the mid 1900’s as globalisation of industry and production from the East began to impact on the manufacturing landscape at large, by strategically developing our vast redundant industrial sites in the Black Country, converting them into thriving trading and warehouse estates more in line with prevailing and future market demand.
1965
Folkes Properties was founded, known at that time as John Folkes Developments
We formally founded Folkes Properties known then as John Folkes Developments. It all started with a 21 acre site Hayes Trading Estate which was surplus land to The Stour Valley Trucks business Folkes ran. The buildings on the site were constructed singularly, when one was let a new one was erected in turn. The intention was to cater to the local industrial market, and, since its completion in 1984, the site has remained fully occupied.
1982
Redevelopment of Old Forge Trading Estate
Following the success of our initial foray into property development, Constantine, who observed the success of his Father’s Hayes Trading Estate and its underpinning of the Group asset base, undertook the redevelopment of the 135,000 sq ft Old Forge Trading Estate in Lye on a 12-acre site. This again was surplus land that had become available when a forging operation was translocated elsewhere. The site involved both refurbishing existing buildings and developing additional new units, again targeting the local industrial demand. This site was successfully let and has remained so since. Constantine now believed that part of the future growth of the Folkes Group lay in property development where trading estates were built, often speculatively, and then retained to secure a strong asset-backed base and long term rent roll that would steady the Group through all market conditions.
1987
Redevelopment of surplus land
With further Folkes Group businesses either translocating or closing during the late 1980s, we repeated the exercise of redevelopment of surplus land and developed 106,000 sq ft at City Estate in Cradley Heath on a 6 acre site.
1989
Revitalising the industrial landscape through regeneration
The 196,000 sq ft Washington Centre in Netherton was built on a site spanning 12 acres. This site had previously been a forging site famously manufacturing the anchors for the Olympic-class ocean liners, including the Titanic.
Both City Estate and Washington Centre were the subject of government intervention via grants to underpin the viability of the redevelopments and create a regeneration in the decimated industrial landscape of the West Midlands that had seen rapid change under the Margaret Thatcher premiership. Here Folkes had decided that the clear strategy was to build nothing smaller than 10,000 sq ft and nothing larger than 50,000 sq ft, this being the “sweet spot” for demand in the small to medium engineering and logistics tenants in the area.
1995
Development of Britannia Park
Saw our first truly speculative development undertaken with the purchase of 17 acres of land and subsequent development of the 250,000 sq ft Britannia Park. Again, this was supported by a government grant to encourage the regeneration of the West Midlands as a manufacturing and logistics hub. As the property business grew the search for sites needed to extend geographically although the strategy was to have no estate more than one hour’s drive from the Groups Head Office in Lye.
1998
Tame Park
9 acres of land were purchased in Tamworth for the development of 125,000 sq ft Tame Park built speculatively.
1999
Wendel Point
Land was purchased and the 162,000 sq ft Wendel Point was speculatively built and let.
As with all the sites developed since 1965, these speculative builds were funded from available cash reserves in the Group. While the speculative build exercise could have been perceived as highly risky, due to our successful judgement on tenant demand, our unit sizing served the local occupier demand perfectly and we have successfully let our units with low vacancy rates ever since.
2000s
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Today
2000s
South Africa Initiative.
In the 2000s, the group sought to establish property diversification and has since built a convenience retail mall portfolio in South Africa of 12 sites totalling 1,750,000 square feet
Present Day.
Today we continue to seek to expand our commercial portfolio within our area of expertise, serving tenant demand within the thriving sectors we understand best, whilst cultivating and nurturing strong, collaborative partnerships with our development partners and our financial stakeholders.
