Innerglass celebrates deal with UK’s largest pub company

A North East family firm which has been supplying glasses to the leisure industry for more than 40 years has raised a toast to a major deal with the UK’s largest pub company.

Peterlee-based Innerglass Ltd forms part of the IG Group, which has been selling catering supplies to some of the biggest names in the hospitality and leisure industry since 1973.

The company, which has 165 employees, has recently topped its most successful year – in which turnover lifted from £21m to £30m – with a major contract with Greene King, the country’s leading pub retailer and brewer.

The deal will see the firm, which is run by third generation family members Stephen Hoey and Lesley Tait, supply glasses to the firm’s 3,000 outlets across the UK.

Mr Hoey, chief executive officer, said: “We are delighted to have had another successful year which has seen the company go from strength to strength.

“We continue to retain our long-held regional and national customers, some of whom have been with us for more than 20 years.”

The business was orginally established in Sunderland, where it still has a warehouse, to provide glassware to the region’s workingmen’s clubs. When the clubs’ demise began, the company was forced to look into diversifying, prompting the directors to look at new sectors.

As a result, the the IG Group now also includes a division selling cleaning products and one which deals with care homes.

Based at the North West Industrial Estate, the company provides glassware, crockery, bar and cocktail supplies from its 150,000 sq ft warehouses at Peterlee and Sunderland, where it holds around 10,000 branded products.

Mr Hoey added: “Winning this latest contract is good news not just for the company but also for our staff and cements our position as the region’s leading organisation supplying the leisure and hospitality sector.”

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