The first charred and blackened sections of the Garrard Waters factory in Caswell Road, Brackmills, were pulled down by contractors yesterday, after fire tore through the 60,000 sq ft warehouse last week.

The property was not fitted with sprinklers, which would have prevented the blaze taking hold.

Luke Hodson, fire protection group manager at Northamptonshire Fire and Rescue Service, said: "There has been millions of pounds of damage, about 35 people could lose their jobs, an industry for Northampton is now gone, and thousands of pounds of taxpayers' money has been spent fighting the fire.

"This building has been destroyed by fire, but had there been a sprinkler system fitted it would been a small fire, the size of a car fire. A crew would have extinguished the fire then left the scene and the business would have and stayed up and running.

"For a new building here, the sprinkler system would be one to three per cent of the total building costs. In more than 95 per cent of fires worldwide where a sprinkler system is fitted buildings survive the fire.

"It's quite alarming that we are still having these fires."

Mr Hodson added: "What is really annoying is that buildings of this size are not required by law to be fitted with sprinkler systems. We urge people to consider it."

Tony Brewer, chief executive of the Headlam Group, which Garrard Waters was part of, said he couldn't comment on whether sprinklers would have stopped the fire.

But he said: "Fire regulations within Northamptonshire don't require sprinklers within a building of the size of Garrard Waters. The fire service were on-site pretty quickly and were damping down the fire."

Mr Brewer said the company had decided to demolish the building.