Travis Perkins celebrated the rollout of its new Range Centres with a visit to the Tilbury, Essex site from Chancellor George Osborne.
The group is opening four of the new heavyside distribution centres across the country, and each is creating a substantial number of new jobs, with recruitment already under way for over 500 posts.

Cardiff's 7,820sq m Range Centre opened in December 2014, joining the existing centre at Warrington. Tilbury will open this July and Coventry in June 2016.

Each Range Centre will supply hundreds of Travis Perkins branches, ensuring that every one has immediate access to a much wider range of stock along with the option of next-day delivery on any unavailable products.

Travis Perkins group supply chain development manager Joel Brown said: "It was fantastic to receive a visit from George Osborne and celebrate all the job opportunities we're creating."

Travis Perkins has also opened a new hub for lightside materials. The Omega Centre in Warrington will serve over 450 branches and stock 19,000 SKUs, and the group will be investing £600m a year in this hub to provide customers with increased lightside stock levels and faster delivery.