Our journey so far
CheckFire aims to equip all our customers with innovative products and unrivalled knowledge and insight for vital fire safety and protection. Throughout our 48 years in the trade, we have celebrated many milestones with so much more development to come in the years ahead.
CheckFire Founded
The CheckFire story began in 1975 when Dr David Robins decided to change his career in education to one of business venture. Soon after launch, one of the very first fire extinguishers sold was a 2 gallon water cartridge operated fire extinguisher.
Opening of the home office
Our office and warehouse has expanded over time but the first upgrade was in 1983 when we converted the double garage in the family home into an office.
Time to expand and relocate
This year we relocated from our original home office, to our office based in Caerphilly - an office we still operate from to this day!
The beginning of Commander
2002 marked the beginning of the Commander brand. Originally brought in via a component form and was both filled and assembled in our own workshops as a service exchange range.
Introducing CommanderEDGE
Seven years later we introduced CommanderEDGE, our fully Kitemarked range, which also includes brand exclusive units MultiCHEM and EnviroFoam.
Further expansion for CheckFire
This year, we acquired our 30,000ft2 Distribution Centre, just a few miles down the road from our Caerphilly Head Office. This equipped us to effectively trade on a national scale, and further expand our team.
10 years of Commander
This was an exciting year for us as we celebrated the 10th anniversary of the Commander brand registration. With over 15 fire extinguishers included in the range, this was a very proud moment for the team.
Contempo: an industry first
The launch of Contempo was an industry first, born out of the realisation that fire safety was being sacrificed in order to maintain appearances within luxury settings.
Development for Commander
This year we remodelled a number of our Commander units with many featuring higher fire ratings and Kitemark certification on select units.
We were also proud to launch our Commander Stand range in 2018 and their still going strong!
A fresh look for our website
A fresh new look was given to the CheckFire website in 2018 and since then it has grown in content, resources and shopping capabilities - with lots more exciting developments in the pipeline.
Tubular Stand transformation
In 2019 we worked with our customers on understanding the challenges they faced with the previous design of our Tubular Stands and developed a solution that took the pains away.
Development in exceptional times
The Commander Safety Box was the latest innovation to join our range of Commander Storage Solutions in 2020, and we also introduced Rapid-10, a portable santising solution to support with keeping the nation safe during the Pandemic.
New brochure and digitalisation
The latest edition of the CheckFire brochure became available in March 2020, launched in a digital format, to not only support with the reduction in paper and our carbon footprint, but in line with our commitment of taking thorough measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
Developments to CommanderEDGE
We made developments to our existing Water, Foam and Powder fire extinguishers from CommanderEDGE in April 2021. Featuring increased fire ratings*, the newly developed units are at the fore of product innovation.
Further product launches
We were delighted to expand the existing CommanderEDGE range and introduce a 6ltr Water Mist, as well as Commander Stand Inserts to provide additional protection and stability.
New Northern Depot
This year we celebrated the opening of our new Northern Depot, offering our trade customers who are local to the North CheckFire services a little closer to home.