A Retrofit App designed to assist social landlords reduce fuel poverty has helped Cruden Building & Renewals take home the prize for Most Innovative Contractor at the prestigious UK-wide Housing Innovation Awards 2016.

The Awards, which took place in London on 18 February, aim to recognise and reward housing providers and companies who come up with innovative and inventive projects and new ways of working.

Part of the Cruden Group, Cruden Building & Renewals is an innovative construction company with operations across the West of Scotland. It employs around 400 staff to deliver high quality mixed tenure housing projects for local authorities, RSLs and co-operatives and has particular expertise in the field of regeneration. Cruden is also part of the City Legacy consortium that built The Athletes’ Village for the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games.

One of Cruden’s innovations in 2015 was its new Retrofit App for the housebuilding sector, which was developed in partnership with BRE. This user-friendly app tells landlords what they need to do to upgrade a property, how much it will cost, and how much money it will save in maintenance and running costs. It has the potential to help social housing tenants by improving health through making homes warmer and cheaper to run, and by making upgrades less disruptive. It will allow social landlords to upgrade properties more efficiently and save money on maintenance costs.

Allan Callaghan, managing director of Cruden Building & Renewals, said: “I’m absolutely delighted that Cruden Building & Renewals has been recognised at a national level for its commitment to innovation in what has been a very successful year for us. It is a fantastic achievement for all our staff right across the organisation - innovation is part of best practice shared across the Cruden Group.

“As well as the launch of our Retrofit App following on from our very successful energy efficient new build housing design model Cruden C4S, we are always looking for ways to innovate to make things better for our customers. Key to Cruden’s continued growth and success is our commitment to pioneering construction technologies and integrated management systems, which ensure we can consistently operate highly efficient working practices resulting in project delivery on time and on budget.”