A BURY company are in line for a national award after reducing costs and improving profits. John Spencer (Hazelhurst) Ltd, who recently celebrated 150 years in business, have been entered for the Norweb Business Energy Awards. Winners of the regional awards will go through to a national final. The company, which makes the screens used to print wallpaper and textiles, has installed a new curing oven at its Bolton Road West premises, which has resulted in increased productivity.

The screens are made from nickel mesh, coated with a special polymer, prior to being cured and engraved with the wallpaper pattern.

The company's old oven was slow and inefficient, causing a hot working environment and the occasional expensive reject, and because of its limited size, coating and curing of the larger screens had to be sub-contracted. "The whole process has been a huge success, " said Colin Campbell, the company's cost control manager. "We have reduced production costs and increased productivity to the extent that the new oven literally paid for itself in just three months, as well as radically improving the working environment."

The company intend to develop a museum to show how the process was carried out 150 years ago.

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