Allison was there to celebrate the opening of the firm's first timber-frame plant south of the border. The Aberdeen-based business is the UK's largest supplier of timber systems to housebuilders and the capacity of the £12m plant at Witney, near Oxford, will increase its turnover to £2m a month.
The factory is part of an aggressive expansion that Allison has embarked on. In addition to making timber-frame systems, the firm builds about 1000 private residential homes a year in Scotland. Once its Oxfordshire factory is established, it plans to attack the English market with the launch, or acquisition, of an English housebuilder. "The plan over the next three years is to get ourselves into the English market," explains the diminutive Allison, speaking quickly with a soft Dundee lilt.
Dressed in a mustard shirt, his top button undone, tie loosened (and hurriedly done up when the photographer arrives), and jacket slung over the back of his chair, he looks incongruous beside the loud, pinstriped businessmen at the other tables. But his demeanour is deceptive: in the 13 years since he joined the group, the former accountant has raised its turnover from £15m to £180m.
With such a commitment to timber frame, he must be concerned that another World in Action programme could jeopardise his investment? Af