In business, real innovation doesn’t always happen at the largest companies. Rather, the most progressive innovation is more likely to be found in the agile SME sector, where companies typically have more risk tolerance, more freedom, and more inclination to chase down their ideas and develop them into new products.
While not every idea will result in a new product, the appetite for innovation and the ability to pursue innovation is one of the advantages of being an established Australian owned SME business like Crosbe. Since 2011 Crosbe has built its business on a culture of innovation. We see it as our mission to discover and share the wonders of cement chemistry, by listening to the needs of the market and empowering our people to respond with ‘fit for purpose’ solutions, all while operating in a socially conscious manner.
We do this by actively investing in real world R&D and embracing new technologies to consistently produce quality engineered cement products for the market. We are firm believers in the ‘science of strength’. It’s what drives us to innovate and pursue real-world research and development and product design in our cutting edge, NATA accredited laboratory at our Sydney headquarters.
“Innovation is a constant part of Crosbe,” explains Managing Director, Albert Haddad. “It’s in our mission statement. Our technical team are constantly working on new opportunities, whether it’s to make our products safer by reducing the amount of silica in, or new products that fill a gap in the market where products just don’t exist. Or it could be refining or improving an existing product so it can be used in a more efficient way.”
Transitioning from reseller to manufacturer
While Crosbe marked its first decade in business in 2021, the pivotal moment that changed the course of the business came at the start of 2018. This is when Haddad and his leadership team decided to manufacture and bring to market their own Crosbe products and change the business model from strictly reselling to a reseller-manufacturer hybrid.
Following extensive R&D, Crosbe began manufacturing a specialised and truly unique PT Grout product that solved a lot of problems within the industry and for users on site. PT Grout offered significant advantages in reducing bleed, was moreefficient and greatly reduced waste.
“It gave customers and contractors an opportunity to eliminate some unwanted site practices that were possibly leading to lower standards of work,” explains Crosbe’s Adam Giles of the new PT Grout product. “There really wasn’t an alternative available in the market. It was certainly a unique product at the time, and it still is.”
Following the success of Crosbe’s PT Grout product, the company then followed up with a range of other innovative, specialised products for the PT industry.
“[Albert] decided that rather than only selling other people’s products, Crosbe could develop and manufacture its own specialised PT Grout product. And with that followed a range of other specialised products that were really suited to the PT industry.”
“Innovation is a constant part of Crosbe. It’s our mission statement.”
What ‘customer focus’ really means at Crosbe
At Crosbe, we always welcome direct engagement with our customers, because it enables us to learn more about their needs and how we can refine our existing products. This helps us to pre-empt our customers’ needs, identify their pain points, and create products that specifically address those pain points.
As a market-led business, if there is a solution that our customers could benefit from using that isn’t already available, we will create it for them. We do this by not just listening to our customers’ needs, but also by directly involving them in the research, development, testing, and refining of our new products.
One such example of that is our InfraGrout 100 product, a high-strength, high-flow, low-bleed, pumpable cementitious grout with extended working time. It has been specifically designed for general civil applications, including grouting of ground anchors, temporary anchors, and soil nails.
We regularly invite our customers into our NATA accredited laboratory at our Sydney headquarters to work hand in hand with our team of industrial chemists, including product testing to ISO 17025. This helps to ensure that the new cementitious grouts and other products we develop precisely solve their problems and make their jobs easier.
“Since our founding in 2011 we have built our business on a culture of innovation.”
A variety purchasing options for Crosbe customers
At Crosbe, our customer focus goes beyond how we design and produce our products and extends to how we sell our products.
Our clients can choose to deal directly with our head office, or they can enjoy the convenience of buying from one of our many resellers, who are located up and down the eastern seaboard of Australia in NSW, Victoria, and Queensland.
For our standard range of products, such as Crosbe GP cement, many Crosbe customers go to their local Crosbe reseller. However, for our more complex products, such as our Post-Tensioning and Ground Engineering products, many customers choose to contact us and deal directly with the Crosbe team.
Start the conversation with Crosbe
Based in the western Sydney suburb of Seven Hills, Crosbe is an Australian innovator offering a wide range of cementitious grouts and mortars. Contact us on 1300 797 560 or email info@crosbe.com to learn more about how we can support your work.
