The sanitaryware division of the Imperial Ware Group – Ours Sanitary Ware, Impulse Bathrooms, Imperial Bathroom Products and Imperial Ware Australia – has been reviewed at a recent meeting in Hong Kong.

It was concluded that, with the recent downturn of one of the group’s core markets in Australia, the UK businesses would not be able to achieve the target sales volumes required to reach the breakeven point in a viable timescale, and there would be an unacceptable level of funding placed on parent company HKR International (HKRI) going forward.

Therefore HKRI is proposing to fully close Ours Sanitary Ware and Impulse Bathrooms, which implies the loss of 192 jobs across both businesses.

The business has not been placed into liquidation or into administration, and production to complete existing orders will continue in the short term.

This sad news was announced to the workforce at lunchtime on Monday 7 October.

Negotiations are ongoing with external parties who have expressed an interest in acquisition of the businesses. These possibilities along with any other alternatives will be fully explored as quickly as possible to avoid the closure of the businesses.