Our History, Our Future
In April 2024 we celebrated 55 years in business, it all started out with Jack Marston, founding the business back in 1969.
Jack set up to work for himself after years of honing his skills and knowledge in the sheet metal engineering industry for local firms in West Yorkshire. It was a struggle at first, Jack then with a wife and two young sons, would often walk miles to work when money was a little scarce for the bus fare, reinvesting every spare penny back into the business for machinery and materials. Initially he held off the expense of a delivery vehicle and he could tell you stories of hand delivering fabricated products on the old Hebble busses. Occasionally he wouldn’t be allowed to board (when items were a little too large), so he would find himself waiting for the next bus hoping the next driver would be more lenient. This grit and determination could only mean Jack would succeed, slowly but surely it did, and as the business started to grow, he employed further engineers and later his wife Irene joined to support Jack and staff by looking after the books.
Initially the business started out as J Marston Engineers making anything it could for local businesses, soon concentrating in fabrication of coal truck hoppers. To be successful Jack needed to diversify and not solely rely on the coal industry products, we found ourselves with an excellent opportunity to make fume cupboards for a client that originally had them made from wood, the steel cupboards had many advantages and became a great success. We didn’t stop there, we developed our air handling equipment range and soon found ourselves making equipment for many sectors including Pathology and Mortuary, this naturally led us to start manufacturing mortuary equipment and thus we created Mortuary Solutions, a division of J Marston Engineers Ltd to concentrate and specialise in the Mortuary sectors.
We continue with our air handling and containment engineering services which can be found at:
When Jack decided to retire in 2005 he passed the reigns to son Paul Marston, and soon after in 2007 we became a Ltd company. Paul has been with the business since a teenager but was first sent out into the big world for experience before being allowed to join the family business. Jack taught Paul well, work hard, be fair and to always lead by example! That is why you still find Paul getting up before the birds to perform installs all over the UK, you won’t find any of our competitors owners/management being so hands on and committed!
Pauls younger sister, Julie become office manager in 2002, her voice will often be the one you hear answering the phone. Julie took over her mother Irene’s reins managing accounts, purchasing, scheduling installations and much more to keep the business operating smoothly.
We have further family members including nephew Daniel (third generation) and brother-in-law Andrew as engineers. We truly remain an independent family business with family values. Having such proud, honest, and fair working practices we have an exceptionally low turnover of staff, our staff average over 20 years of service, this achieves excellent continuity and understanding of the business to deliver reliable, high quality equipment time and time again.
Jack continued to lend a hand, running small errands, and bringing treats in on Fridays until we sadly lost him in May 2023.
His legacy and principles will live on through his family, extended work family, and of course the family business that he built with such great foundations.
Our Installations
