30 Years On And Still Going Strong, Happy Birthday To Renco Nets

When our Managing Director, Rene Jorgensen, first landed on the shores of the Humber Bank back in 1988, he hardly expected to be heading-up one of the UK’s most highly-respected netting manufactures all these years later.

But, as we prepare to celebrate our 30th birthday this month, Rene – and everyone here at Renco Nets – are delighted to still be leading the industry forward. And more importantly, we’re so excited to see what the next 30 will bring.

How it all began

Back in the late 80s, the fishing industry in Grimsby was still booming. At the time Rene was working as a sales clerk with a small Danish firm, regularly travelling across the North Sea to visit the docks to source new clients.

As he enjoyed his visits more and more, Rene spotted a ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ opportunity and decided to stay this side of the sea to set up shop. It was in this moment, Renco Nets was born.

In our earliest days we mainly focused on fishing. We began by supplying basic trawler nets to local fishing firms, but as we grew, we would import and distribute supplies all over the UK.

The Grimsby fishing industry helped our business find a firm footing, but as it sadly began to fade, we needed to broaden our horizons. We needed to cast our net further afield…literally.

Luck would have it we were approached at the time by a very smart chap called Rupert Oliver. His idea to provide children with safe play areas – the concept today known as ‘soft play’ – was still in its infancy. Those old enough to remember the BBC’s Tomorrow’s World programme would have seen Rupert pitching his invention back in 1972.

Crossing paths with Renco, Rupert wondered if we might be able to provide the netting for the ‘soft play’ idea he was developing. We were happy to oblige and began supplying all different kinds of netting for venues all across the UK.

Soft play would take off in a big way and is now a popular activity with children and parents alike. Most recently, as well as traditional soft play venues, we’ve begun to supply netting for increasingly popular ‘Trampoline’ and ‘Ninja’ parks, which are starting to open up around the UK.

Always moving forward

One of the reasons we’re able to develop new netting solutions for a variety of industries (fishing, agriculture, entertainment) is in a large part thanks to another very smart chap called Clive Radcliffe. Early in our history, he showed us how to braid nets and helped devise a machine that could tie knots.

That said, today all the highly trained craftsmen and women here at Renco can make almost any net they like using their hands alone. It’s this high level of craftsmanship and the consistent quality of service we provide that has seen us grow to a business now serving over 2,500 content customers.

But we hope to introduce many new customers to our work during the next 30 years and should your company be in need of netting for any reason, don’t hesitate to get in touch to find out how we can help.