How a staff newsletter is driving business success

30 April 2012

‘From the Rock Face’, the Breedon Aggregates staff newsletter, has been a success from the first issue. It unites the 800 employees based at local quarries and plants throughout Central England and Scotland and is a great way to publicise staff initiatives that are helping drive the company to further success.

“Our staff love Rock Face,” said Stephen Jacobs, Breedon Aggregates Head of Communications. “It’s been a success right from the start. All our quarries and plants are very local businesses, so it is important they also feel part of the larger group. The newsletter helps us achieve this. For the first time staff were able to share news and experiences across the entire business. It’s their communication medium. We get to know one another and are better informed about what is going on elsewhere within the group. We also use it to regularly publicise the ‘Best of Breedon’ scheme, which rewards employees for the ideas and projects they put forward to improve the performance of the business. This helps generate further ideas, so helps with the ultimate success of the business.

“We write the stories in-house and prepare a basic page plan and then leave it to Quiet Storm to design and print. It works really well. Quiet Storm understands our business, provide a great service and are on our doorstep.”

“When we decided to start the newsletter we asked employees to suggest a name for it. Once we had this, Quiet Storm designed the masthead. We also asked staff what they would like to be included and it was their responses that provided the content for the first issue. By the second issue we were able to fill eight pages. The newsletter is very popular and no two issues look the same.”

‘From the Rock Face’ is a lively mix of company news and local success stories. It also features staff personal achievements as well as community and charity initiatives. Once the outline page plan and content has been received by the Quiet Storm design team the newsletter is set on the page, proof read and then printed using Quiet Storm’s in-house digital printers. This provides a cost effective method of producing high quality print on low and medium quantity runs.

Breedon Aggregates is the largest independent aggregates company in the UK. It operates as two fully-integrated autonomous businesses, each with its own management team, in England and in Scotland. The company supplies a wide range of products and services to the construction and building sectors. Breedon Golden Amber gravel has been used for pathways in the London Olympic Village, Buckingham Palace and now for the gardens at Kensington Palace, the home of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

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