I left school at 16. A very happy day! After an assortment of jobs such as working in a marker garden nursery on a government training scheme, (A paltry £23.50 a week wages) my father got me a job with him at a large building site where I would be a steel fixer alongside him. That job lasted through the changing seasons and when summers and winters were either long and hot or very long and sub zero temperatures in the winter. This set me up for tolerating working outside. Working in the building trade certainly runs in my blood. My father and my grandfather were both steel fixers. My grandfather was one of those in charge of teams of men building dams in India many years ago.
After a few years of working as a steel fixer and myself being in charge of a team of steel fixers, the country fell into a recession in the early 1990’s. Work was scarce and so I started my own landscaping business. I remember my first contract was to lay a paved pathway for an elderly couple. After this, work started to slowly pick up. Money was still scarce and finding work was difficult but I persevered. I dipped back into steel fixing a couple of times but it wasn’t as satisfying as working for myself, landscaping. After my father died I never went back to steel fixing and worked even harder to make a success of my landscaping business. Work was more readily available and it ranged from small scale contracts to larger contracts such as building large and long brick walls. This led to my first contract of building an extension to a house. These soon escalated to building a full house and garage. After years of a range of different varieties of contracts I decided to scale it down to a select few. Blockpaving and paving being the main ones. I personally think that getting great feedback from satisfied customers is the best feeling. It’s great also when people passing by whilst I’m blockpaving a driveway and commentating on how good it looks is such a good feeling. I like to take pride in my work and look forward to meeting new customers and giving them the best of my experience and a finished project that I’m proud of.