Tag: business ventures

Where It All Began 27

When the apple picking ended I needed something to occupy me until December. And then? I hear you ask. The plan was to head to Greece for some orange picking. I got a message from my niece remember her?

The Author as a boy

She was now married with three children, just moved into a house in Lincoln, and needed a bathroom tiling, a patio laying and rooms decorated. So in exchange for food and board we travelled to Lincoln, and I began work. Oh! Did I mention I built a rabbit ramp and taught them to climb? 😂The time passsed very quickly and it was great to catch up. But a circular patio, a bit of painting, and tiling doesn’t take long.

By November I needed to crack on, but it was too early for Greece so I contacted my old disco boss. Christmas parties were looming and I knew he’d be desparate for DJ’s. I was right, he immediately offered his caravan at his base for Sally and myself. I could do as many disco’s as I wanted, and he’d pay me to help install the rigs. We arrived on 20th November at 4pm. The first thing he said was. “Take my business off me, please!” They had had enough. The new manager hadn’t worked out, and believe it or not, it was a stressfull business. Especially in December when we would be expected to carry out over 200 events. The venues I had secured during the recession would possibly give you one wedding a week. But in December they could have up five function rooms operating every night, full with Christmas parties, and as the resident disco company you were expected to supply the entertainment for all of them. By 7pm Sally and I were in the pub discussing the logistics. We decided it was an interesting offer, there was only one problem, we didn’t have any money 😂.

We went back and I offered them a deal. I would pay them a certain amount each year for ten years. I would get a mortgage through the business and move the entire operation away. In other words they could retire. I got us through that December “94” (Could be a song there 😂) And the following Spring we found a house with a huge workshop and a swimming pool attached. The only problem was the huge garden, but hey! I could get a gardener to sort that😂

I had ideas for the pool. I knocked a door through from the workshop to allow for loading, and boarded the pool over to make a store. And voila! From humble apple picker six months ago, I was now the owner of the largest disco business in the North of England 😂

What could go wrong?

Happy Trails, Folks x

Where It All Began 22

The next three years I spent building my boss’s disco business. We had a major recession which started in 1989. I pointed out that in Chinese, crisis can mean opportunity. I embarked upon a major sales campaign, visiting every hotel in the area, taking coffee with hotel banqueting manageress’. They had resident disco’s but these guys could be a little unreliable, so I gave them a backup option. To be honest that wasn’t really work 😂By 1991 the recession lifted a little and the seeds I had sown matured, we had gone from 10 disco units to 30, and had claimed 20 hotel residencies. The concept was, we installed the units, paid a DJ for the gig and collected the units afterwards. Plus we’d employed someone to help with installations and collections. By this time we were the largest operators in the north of England. I had a few relationships, but girls generally want someone who isn’t out most nights until the early hours, so they didn’t last long. One pleasure I took was that I had no T.V for four years.

I was still running and I’d done the York and several other Half Marathons in 90mins. I was a DJ in demand myself by now. Mainly because I played music from the 50’s to the 90’s I also used Barn Dancing as an icebreaker, and had a collection of ballroom LPs. I prefered the upmarket marquee gigs which usually finished at 5am. I could also be a bit cheeky, but one evening my mouth got me into a little trouble. I was doing a private girls school dance for the 6th formers and they’d asked for some Barn dances. I announced a dance called Strip The Willow. Before my brain engaged my mouth, I asked “And who wants to be Willow?” The principle wasn’t over joyed.

But, as always I had the wandering bear someway deep, down inside. I decided it was time to travel. I informed my employers I would be leaving a year later. This may sound like a long notice period but by now I was running everything, they were lovely people, I needed time to plan, and I didn’t want all my hard work to go to rack and ruin. A year soon passes, we had found someone to take over, he was one of the more mature DJ’s, and seemed very keen. I had decided I was going to go wherever my fancy took me, first stop would be France. I had bought a Volkswagon Camper. And I was finalsing my plans when I met Sally (real name but she won’t mind) We hit it off from the word go, and when she informed me she had always wanted to travel it seemed I had a travelling companion.

Not a very exciting post this week, but there’s a change coming 😂

Happy Trails, Folks x