Firm Expands To Australia, Britain And United States

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29734, 30 January 1962, Page 14

Firm Expands To Australia, Britain And United States

A commercial cleaning business which began with one employee in Christchurch in 1940 has now grown to more than 3400 employees. It has become established throughout New Zealand, in Australia, and in Britain, and will start in the United States this year.

Mr E. A. Crothall, chairman of the board of directors of Crothall and Company, Ltd., who has just returned from a two-year business trip, said yesterday that he thought his company was probably the first New Zealand firm which provided services, as against manufacturing, to be able to set up on a large scale in another country.

The firm began as cleaners to commercial firms and then branched out into cleaning hospitals, he said. In Britain a contract had been gained for the maintenance of the Radcliffe Infirmary, the teaching hospital for Oxford University, and then other contracts had been gained so that now the firm was employing more than 400 persons When Mr Crothall first tried to introduce his commethods into British hospitals there were complaints from several unions whose members were engaged in that type of work about the new methods his company was using. Asked if the differences with the unions had been resolved. Mr Crothall said his company had set about winning the confidence of the unions which had thought some of their members might become redundant, and to a large extent had succeeded.

“The unions have begun to realise that our company provides a good service and also excellent prospects for promotion something that was lacking before for their members ” How had a New Zealand company managed to break into the highly competitive commercial cleaning business in Britain? Mr Crothall said his company had not suddenly discovered some magic formula which had enabled it to match overseas firms.

What his firm did was to make a survey of a hospital’s particular needs, find out what their problems were, and then try to find a way which led to those needs

being satisfied and the problems solved to the satisfaction of the hospital and the company.

"Really, in a way. we are selling training. The whole basis of the company’s operations is that it is selling services. Because of this the staff have to be highly trained so that the work we do is done in fewer man hours than other companies could do the same job ”

He said his firm was not merely cleaning hospitals It provided the complete staff and equipment to maintain the hospital in all respects The company hoped to start in Chicago later in the year, said Mr Crothall. Asked why Chicago, he said because there appeared to be scope there and because he had business acquaintances in Chicago Mr Crothall said he did not know of any other New Zealand company which sold services that had started in the United States

Mr Crothall said that the tertiary industries, those providing services to the public and the commercial world, were now becoming far more important than previously Transport was perhaps the best example of a tertiary industry. another was the hotel industry. The study of management and its relation to planning and staff training had played a large part in the success nt his company, said Mr Crothall He was a firm believer in management training, for this was the only way by which current trends in overseas business eculd be assimilated in New Zealand.