Industrial services group Brammer outlined aggressive growth plans for 2008 after posting a 21% rise in sales for the past year.

The company, which distributes engineering components, saw annual pre-tax profit increase by 2.1% to £14.9 million after targeting defensive industries. It prioritised sales of repair and maintenance kit to the food and beverage, paper, utilities and cement industries.

This year will see it continue to focus on these sectors, while also adding pharmaceuticals, recycling, water treatment and automotive to its principle industries.

Around 29% of group revenue comes from key accounts, namely customers who uses its services nationally including packaging giant Smurfit Kappa and car safety equipment group TRW. Soap to hair care specialist Proctor & Gamble used to have 50 engineers authorised to buy maintenance equipment, resulting in the company using around 100 supplies. Brammer has since won the contract to be the sole supplier, helping P&G to save money.

It is considering an acquisition in Portugal after being approached by one of its key account customers wanting country-wide service.

Brammer operates in a £20 billion market. Around £2 billion is bearings, where it has 12% market share. The remainder is for items like mechanical belts, chains, motors and sprockets, where it only has 3% market share. It plans to increase this figure through a mixture of organic and acquisition-led growth.

Chief executive Ian Fraser insists Brammer has yet to see any slowdown in business relating to economic uncertainty. 'We've been so far unaffected. The worst case scenario is maintenance programmes will be carried out at wider intervals, which would have a negative impact on ordering for industrial components, but the outlook at the moment remains solid for us.'

Shares in the company advanced by 7% to 255p on the full-year results.