A FAILED expansion project contributed to the closure of a 200-year-old printing business in Ringwood.

Malcolm and Miriam Kennedy, bosses of Brown & Son, closed the doors at the Crow Arch Lane business for the last time on Friday after telling 30 staff not to return on Monday.

One member of staff told the Echo: "We were all asked to go into work unpaid on Friday and then the receiver came in and said we had all been made redundant.

"We were all very upset and angry. We were promised things that never materialised."

The company is said to owe its creditors more than £1 million.

Mr Kennedy said he was "gutted" at the closure.

He had been in contact with paper suppliers that were owed money with a revised offer of 50p in the pound but they stuck together and refused the offer.

"Once they did that there was nowhere to go," he said.

"We were the fifth owners in nearly 200 years and it's a tragedy that it didn't get to happen.

"We got ourselves into difficulties but we could have got out of the difficulties."

He was forced to make 21 staff redundant from a branch of Brown & Son at Ferndown Industrial Estate at the end of January.

The factory had been opened in September.

"It was contributory, but it wasn't the main factor," he said.

"The cost of setting it up and running it just couldn't be supported in today's climate. It was a factor but not THE factor."

A creditors' meeting is due to take place on April 22, he said.

First published: April 6