Growth helps Matko Hire business expand to new site

The move will relieve congestion at Matko Hire's current Raglan Parade site, where just three cars can park, offering a new location further west with space for 33 cars.

Chris Smith, the owner, is leasing the former car dealership site and now has council approval to move in.

"It will have a better flow," Mr Smith said.

He grew up on a Purnim dairy farm and worked as an electrical linesperson before buying the hire company, which like many trade and construction businesses has boomed during the pandemic.

"We were one of the lucky ones," Mr Smith said. "Especially with the DIY stuff with COVID; people were looking for stuff to do on weekends. They couldn't go on holidays."

While people renting portable toilets and cool rooms dried up as events stopped, demand for scaffold, bobcats, mowers, chainsaws and other equipment has risen.

The new site will have an undercover drive-through, offering loading space for hire equipment, while a space at the rear will house a growing landscaping division offering soils and sands.

The current site employs seven workers but Mr Smith said there could be three more jobs in the year ahead.

"The business has grown and we need more space," he said.

The exterior of the building has remained mostly unchanged but the showroom and interior has been renovated.

The move also spells an end to about half a century of car sales on the land.

Pat Gleeson, who owns the land with wife Helen, said it had been a car dealership for at least five years before he bought the land and business there in 1976 and later leased the site to Clinton Baulch Motor Group.

Clinton Baulch Motor Group has been at a new east Warrnambool showroom since late 2017.

Mr Gleeson said there had been many changes in the motoring industry in recent years, and there was no longer a need for as many car dealerships as there once were.

CORRECTION - A previous version of this story incorrectly reported that Chris Smith bought the Raglan Parade site he is moving into. It is in fact owned by Pat Gleeson.

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