Part of TCI Group · UK design, UK manufacturing capability, since 2019
You'll find us at Unit 15, Waterloo Park, Bidford-on-Avon, Warwickshire, B50 4JG. Call us on 01789 224228 or use our contact form. We're open Monday to Friday, 08:30 to 17:00. Send us a drawing, a photograph or the part itself, and we'll give you a route, a reason and a cost per part.
How to reach us
One workshop, one phone number, and the people who answer your call are the same people who make your tooling.
You can find TCI Mouldings at Unit 15, Waterloo Park, Bidford-on-Avon, Warwickshire, B50 4JG, GB. Call us on 01789 224228 or use our contact form. Our office is open Monday to Friday, 08:30 to 17:00, and closed at weekends.
Waterloo Park is a few minutes off the A46 between Alcester and Stratford-upon-Avon, putting us within a morning's drive of Birmingham, Coventry, Oxford, Bristol and most of the M40 corridor. You can park on site. If you are bringing a large pattern, please let us know when arranging your visit so someone is available to help you carry it in.
The most useful thing you can do is send us the part. A sample in the post lets us answer questions about draft, undercuts, surface and release in about a minute. It can save a fortnight of emails describing a shape. If you cannot send the part, photographs with a steel rule in shot, a sketch or CAD are all helpful. We are happy to work from a hand drawing on the back of an envelope too. We have quoted plenty of tooling from worse.
To help us guide you, tell us four things: what you are casting into the mould, roughly how many parts you need over the life of the product, which features have to survive, and who is going to demould it. Those four answers decide the route and the material, and without them, any quotation is only a guess dressed up as a number.
You will receive a recommended route, the reason we chose it over the other four, the material family and a cost per part, rather than just a bare tooling figure. If your quantity does not justify tooling, or another kind of supplier suits you better, we will say so. It is a shorter conversation than investing in a tool nobody uses.
For food and confectionery work, tell us about any declarations you need in your first email. These jobs are shaped by the required grade and paperwork as much as by the mould's form, so sharing those details early can help you avoid specifying a mould twice. Prefer to read up before getting in touch? The materials page and technical guides cover the ground we'd otherwise discuss on the phone.
Visits are welcome and well worth the trip. Please ring first so someone who can answer your questions properly is available, rather than mid-pour, and bring your part with you.
Send us the details
Send us a drawing, photograph or sample. We'll come back with a route, the reason for it and a cost per part, with no chasing and no pressure.
What happens next
Whether you need one mould or a repeat programme, the sequence is the same.
Send it by post, email or in person. Tell us what you are casting, the rough quantity you expect over the product's life, which features matter most and who will handle demoulding. If you are unsure about anything, just say so rather than guessing.
This is not a sales desk. Someone who makes moulds reads your part for draft, undercuts, surface, release and split line. You will get a phone call or an email with the awkward questions, so expect to be asked something you had not thought about.
You'll get it in writing: the material family, the trade-offs and the cost per part, including what the recommended route is not suited to. If we think your job needs a different route from the one you requested, we'll explain why.
Checklist
Six things that make your first reply useful, rather than just a list of questions
Nothing beats a physical sample. If you cannot post one, photograph it from several angles with a steel rule in shot so the scale is unambiguous. Please also include a shot of the awkward feature you are worried about.
Whether you are working with Wax, plaster, resin, concrete, chocolate, soap or silicone, the material affects the chemical attack on the mould face, the temperature your tool must withstand and whether food declarations are needed.
It is not just about this order. To compare a soft mould with a hard tool fairly, spread the tooling cost across its whole life. That figure has the biggest effect on your cost per part.
Lettering, fine relief, a sealing face and a flat base can all affect the tool design. Tell us which detail is critical and which is cosmetic, as the two are treated very differently.
A careful maker at a bench and a production operator at the end of a shift have different needs, from hardness to wall thickness. We specify the mould around the person who will actually use it.
Please mention any food-contact declarations, a stated material grade, a temperature rating in writing, or a batch record against the order now, rather than after the tool exists, as this can change the grade.
One group, four specialisms
Shared engineering, one workshop and four specialisms. The tooling knowledge behind a precast yard is also available to a chandler with one product.
Ready to start?
Send us a drawing, photograph or sample. We'll come back to you with a mould strategy, material recommendation and price.
Real people, a real workshop
No call centre and no middlemen. When you contact TCI Mouldings, you speak to the team who design, build and check your mould.
Thomas LaneManaging Director
George PrestonDesign & Project Manager
Kelly BallingerHead of Partnerships
Jim AndertonProduction Manager
TheodoreEmployee Welfare