A Fordham firm hopes plans for a purpose-built marketing and training facility will prove the right package and gain planning approval.

DS Smith Packaging wants to build a specially designed building close to its current premises in Fordham Road to provide the new facilities and help create up to eight new jobs.

The firm, which is one of Europe’s leading packaging companies specialising in state-of-the-art designs, has submitted an application to East Cambridgeshire District Council which includes a design and access statement drawn up by GSS Architecture.

The statement points out the firm ‘employs a large number of local people’ and it is hoped the proposal will ‘continue to raise the profile of the site and other local DS Smith sites at Burwell and Ely’.

It is alos hoped the new marketing and training centre will help the company to ‘maintain the skill sets of its employees’ as well as provide a dedicated room for customer meetings as well as office space for the marketing team.

The internal floor space of the building, which will be to the south of the site away from the main production building to give it its own identity, will be 1,219.3 sq.m.

There will be a new internal access road from the reception area of the existing building to a new 45 space car park. The centre will be built to complement the existing production premises.

The design statement says: “The existing building has a very prominent south facing facade with a large expanse of glazing which can be seen from the main A142 road. This facade has been considered as part of the application to ensure that the proposed building does not detract from the existing building.”

A council report prepared by Andrew Phillips, senior planning officer, recommends councillors delegate the power to approve to the planning manager subject to various conditions and a Section 106 Agreement.