Barry Dixon, Operations Manager at Kambalda Nickel Concentrator, has a strong commitment to the community of Kambalda. He came up with an idea to create a space in the town for community members. BHP had many items of Western Mining Company (WMC) memorabilia in storage and Barry knew this would be something of keen interest to the locals of Kambalda. WMC owned Kambalda mines surrounding the Concentrator prior to BHP, so there is a lot of history and connection with the local community.

As an advocate of local businesses, Barry checked the Local Buying Program for local builders and engaged Next Gen Building to complete a full fit out of the new BHP Community Hub in the Kambalda township. The space is utilised for meetings, training sessions, and is open to the general public three days a week as a drop in place to make a cuppa and have a chat about anything from recruitment or local buying, to air quality control, and sponsorships.

Next Gen Building, a family owned business in the Goldfields, were able to incorporate as much of the materials that were salvaged from the original building as possible, and this was a great way to showcase them.

“Being a local building company based in the Goldfields, we were seeing that a lot of the bigger companies were hesitant to give us a go purely based on our size and I suppose our location. Working with the LBP has been a great convenience, as the payment terms are really easy to work with.

The LBP has been great in ensuring that terms are kept to what is expected and you know when the payments are going to come in which makes it easy to stick to your budgets.”

Chrissy Te Puke, Next Gen Building.