AN award-winning business left devastated by a fire at its head office last year has formally submitted plans to rebuild its factory and offices at the same location.

Gordon Rhodes & Son, part of the Dalesman Group, has been operating nomadically since the fire in August last year, which destroyed its factory and head offices at the Eurocam Technology Park in West Bowling.

It has been operating at temporary sites since the blaze, first in Dick Lane and now in Holland Street, and was recently nominated for a Yorkshire Grit Award at the Yorkshire Food Entrepreneurs Awards for its efforts rising from the ashes, and also received the top AA rating from the British Retail Consortium for its food safety standards.

Gordon Rhodes & Sons produces a range of award-winning sauce mixes, meat rubs, stuffing mixes, and a range of gluten-free mixes, and saw vast swathes of its ingredients and equipment go up in flames in the fire, but worked hard to get production up and running as soon as possible afterwards.

The old building has been demolished, and the plan’s design and access statement says the new building will be built in the same place, but to a “higher quality, more contemporary design” with a more “functional warehouse”.

It states the new rectangular building will “deliver a high quality development with a contemporary and aesthetic outlook”, and will feature a new “fully glazed feature chamfered corner entrance which will provide a focal point to the scheme”.

It added that the location of the warehouse, at the top of the M606 on an industrial estate, made it a “highly sustainable location”.

Gordon Rhodes & Son hopes the new head office and factory will be open and in use by next year.

It will have space for 62 cars and will employ 80 full time staff.

More than 20 fire engines were called to the Gordon Rhodes headquarters on August 9 last year to tackle the huge blaze.

Firefighters said at the time the fire spread quickly due to the building being tin-clad, which made it hard to fight the blaze as it made the structure unsafe, with the area around it having to be evacuated.

Following the fire, senior director Ian Rhodes thanked the fire service for its work to tackle the blaze.

Consultation on the plan is open until Friday, April 13. To comment on the plan visit the planning website or write to the Planning Service at Britannia House, Hall Ings BD1 1HX.