Tom Parker joins Laker Builders Merchants as chairman

Crawley independent builders merchant Laker Builders Merchants has announced that Tom Parker, founder and former owner of Parker Building Supplies, has joined the senior management team as chairman.

“Having Tom Parker choose Laker Builders Merchant is a huge coup for us,” says Laker managing director Steve Robinson. “Recognising our ambitions to expand the business, the Board of Directors needed stewardship, from a knowledgable mentor style relationship, ideally someone with notable experience, who could not only offer insights and guidance to attaining the next level of growth, but actually assist us scale up our business. So we could not think of anyone more suitable, and are now absolutely delighted to welcome Tom to the Laker family.”

Parker sold Parkers Building Supplies in 2017, and, wanting to keep a toe in the merchanting waters,  says he believes with Laker’s ambitious plans, forward-thinking strategy, and approach to sustainability, and digitisation that the company could be the perfect fit.

Having admired Parker’s Builders Merchants and Tom Parker from when he first started Laker back in 2010, operations director Ady Laker fondly remembers that his ambition back then was that one day, Laker would grow to be like Parkers, so he is extremely excited to have Parker on board, especially at this key period in the business’ growth.

On the other hand, with his background in technology, Robinson is keen to have the heavy-side mentorship and knowledge from one of our Industry’s finest, to aid and guide our management team grow our business, utilising Tom’s experience to scale the business.

Parker says he is looking forward to supporting a forward-thinking business such as Laker, who have an exciting growth strategy firmly planted in the future and are “willing to take on board advice and insights from an old school merchant such as me.”