AN OUTDOOR fitness firm is hoping that a move to bring all its manufacturing to East Anglia will keep it in good shape for growth.

By the end of this year, all of the Great Outdoor Gym Company’s products will be moved from China to Garmet Ltd’s factory in Thetford.

The company, which was founded in January 2007, decided to bring its manufacturing back to the UK two years ago.

Garmet employs 35 people in Thetford to make the equipment and by the end of the year the last of the overseas production – including leg presses and shoulder presses – will have transferred to the UK.

As well as plans to expands its UK market, the company is already exporting the equipment to eight countries, including Australia and New Zealand.

“Because we are looking to go global we are already expecting to expand the manufacturing many, many times more the size it is at the moment,” said co-founder and creative director Georgie Delaney.

The company currently employs 12 people in Cambridge and London as well as the 35 that Garmet Ltd employs to build the equipment.

Mrs Delaney said that she believed many more people would be employed as the UK and export markets grow.

She said the firm had decided to return its manufacturing operation to the UK to improve quality.

“We used to have to babysit the whole manufacturing process to ensure it was to our standard,” she said. “We wanted to move over to the UK to improve the quality and to have greater confidence in things like the quality of the steel and the integrity of our cutting and the quality of our welders.”

She added: “It is definitely more expensive to manufacture in the UK, but what we do get is superior material.”