Fifteen staff who will be made redundant at a water softener factory are victims of the company's own success.

Production workers at Culligan, based at the Springwood industrial estate, Braintree, will lose their jobs in January because business has trebled in the past 18 months and the company is relocating to larger premises.

Culligan produces Waterside brand products, the largest-selling water softeners in the UK, from its Braintree site.

General manager for Culligan household division, Peter Marsh, said: "It is always dreadful before Christmas and they were a good team of people and we are very sorry to see them go.

He added: "We needed 40,000 sq ft of factory and we were working out of 17,000 in Crittall Drive."

He said the decision was taken to move to Billingham, near Middlesbrough, where the parent company owns land, which was cheaper than buying land and building a factory in the Braintree area.

Published Wednesday December 19, 2001