A facilities management firm launched in lockdown is marking its first birthday by doubling its workforce.

Elevate FM, based in George Street, Birmingham, was set up last June, offering property maintenance services for schools and businesses.

Instead of having to find, vet and co-ordinate a host of different contractors, clients were able to contact Elevate FM and get the job sorted in one phone call.

The firm started with two people and has now taken on Talesha Chisholm as office administrator and Derek Hands, an in-house maintenance engineer.

Director Beckie Wait said a second maintenance worker was due to be taken on in the next four months and later a business development manager.

“We are delighted to have Talesha and Derek on board,” she said. “To have in-house people like Derek means we can react quickly and assess the job quickly.

“We are very lucky to be expanding after such a turbulent time for a lot of businesses and we expect demand will increase now that people are returning to offices. We are very much looking forward to seeing what 2021 brings.”

Beckie said the firm was set up in June last year when a lot of businesses were finding it difficult to access tradespeople amid the uncertainty that the pandemic brought.

“They were getting let down and they couldn’t find tradespeople that they could rely on,” she said. “A lot of trades were even turning away business, so lockdown helped us progress.

“People still had buildings to maintain even if they didn’t have staff in them – they had to keep the maintenance up to make sure the insurance was still valid.

“Often jobs involve a number of different trades and it can be a real headache contacting them all, coordinating the work and making sure they are the right people for the job.

“When people contact us, we do all of that; we search for the right tradespeople, we vet them, carry out all the necessary checks and co-ordinate the work.

“Then, if you run a school, you can get on with running a school while we get on with sorting the work that needs doing.

“We take all the hassle out of it – it’s one phone call to one person and you know it’s getting sorted, rather than have to ring round and contact a number of different trades.”

Beckie added: “Schools are a big client sector for us as well as property management companies and commercial property agents.

“They often have multiple sites which they can’t always get round to visiting. If we are called out, we are proactive. We’ll have a look and alert them to other issues so it’s like an extra pair of eyes on-site for them.”