UK - boxxtoff is a new flightcase design and manufacturing company based in Manchester and part of the tube uk community. It is a fully autonomous operation producing ‘practical bespoke casing solutions for all types of production related kit’.
Dave Peacock – well-known on the Manchester flightcase scene – heads up the new enterprise, bringing around 35 years industry experience, contacts and an inventive approach to case making.
After a successful career and running several businesses, Dave took a break from the world of flightcasing and joined the team at tube uk two years ago.
Dave initially offered to make a couple of ingenious cases for tube’s Pioneer CDJ kits as a bit of a side hustle, which proved to be “simply fantastic products designed by someone who knows exactly what those using them need to make life simple and keep everything secure,” commented tube’s Melvyn Coote.
After this, Dave was asked to get involved in some more complex case building projects to re-case some of tube’s large stock of audio kit.
Word soon spread on the industry grapevine and some of Dave’s own contacts got wind that he was making cases again, bringing more business into the company from those seeking the quality and crafting that his work guarantees.
Melvyn highlights the benefits of Dave being able to grow the business naturally at his own pace, and now having the advantages and infrastructural support as part of tube uk, which means Dave can concentrate on what he loves – being creative and productive – rather than on getting bogged down in accounting and administration!
These embryonic steps all started in a lockup down the road from tube’s warehouse and grew organically, until this official launch of boxxtoff, which moved into its own warehouse a few miles away in January with substantially more space, better tooling, and CNC cutting to make the operation precise and efficient.
The 2,500sq.ft premises has a further 1,500sq.ft of mezzanine and is just off the M60 in Manchester. It is now set up and a fully functioning manufacturing plant.
In the last year, boxxtoff has completed large orders for Blackburn-based lighting rental company Lite Alternative and Manchester-based production specialists in audio, lighting and rigging, dbnAudile, among many others.
“It’s still essentially a boutique operation,” emphasises Melvyn, Dave is involved in all the design and fabrication processes, and each case is hand-finished to perfection, built from quality materials.
Dave also now has another craftsperson working alongside him, Lewis Trochymenko, who brings his own flair, insights, attention to detail and lateral thinking skills to the team.
boxxtoff can also call on the resources and skills of various tube uk team members like audio engineers John Redfern and Adam Taylor who can assist with CAD drawing as and when needed.
The Lite Alternative job mentioned above involved casing a number of new Kinesys Apex hoists for automation systems that have recently been touring with the Arctic Monkeys and now Niall Horan. A high-end audio control system was cased for immersive mixed reality concert world tour Kagami which is currently out.
Dave and Lewis will also be busy boxing up tube uk’s new infrastructure to go with their d&b KSL speaker system, which arrived last month after a substantial investment by the Manchester-based audio specialist.
