Keeping The Balance

Fast forwarding a few years, in 1983 as a couple, my wife and I settled in Royal Wootton Bassett and had 2 daughters. I was still working as an accountant for various different companies in the local area (not at the same time!), and progressed through many disciplines of accountancy roles. At the company where I worked as Group Chief Accountant in Swindon, I reported to a person with the same name as the then current Prime Minister, John Major. This made for lots of fun conversations with friends and family about my work!

With a rather sedentary job, finding a way to stay fit and healthy was important to me. I always have had a love of cycling, especially since watching the 1976 Tour De France in Paris on the Champs Elysee. So turning my hobby into a way of not only keeping fit, but also a way to commute to work (15 miles there and back!) was an easy decision. After a while I joined a cycling club, which has given me plenty of amusing, if not painful, stories to tell!  

During this time, the family business was still carrying on until my parents and uncle retired and then it was sold to another company. It was sad to see the business leave the family, but life moves on as they say.

Just over 20 years ago from today, I was working for a major company near Swindon, that had a gave me an opportunity to switch from Finance to an IT role, specifically looking after their Finance systems. I was still not travelling much at that stage, although I had a few business trips to Munich. 

It was not until I was head hunted by a software company based in Alton, Hampshire when I took on the role of a Finance Systems Consultant. I was then sent to many different locations where their clients were, to provide support and work on specific projects at the time.This position took me to Manchester, Redhill, Cambridge, Kings Lynn and many more. I had always enjoyed driving and at that time I was driving a Vauxhall Omega pictured below which was so comfortable and smooth, but also a great family car. 

Our final Vauxhall before we bought our first Jaguar in 2006

I now discovered that like my father, I had the stamina to drive long distances. As I have said in previous blogs, my father was also an RAC recovery driver, rescuing people whose vehicles had broken down. It was fun to hear about my father’s stories of people he had picked up and taken to their destination in different places throughout Britain, with their vehicle behind them on the trailer. I seemed to have found my ideal job as I was fulfilling a passion for driving, but was able to earn an income from a demanding job as well. As with many good things, there was a down side. With the increase of travelling, I was spending more and more time away from my growing family.

This was a situation that was difficult to balance, but after 3-4 years with that company, I found a role with another major global corporate company in the area that was just 6 miles away from our home. By then, we had a third daughter who was growing up rapidly, so this seemed ideal.

The bonus was that there was still some travel, but not nearly as much as before…… initially, that is.

From coaches to elbow grease and sky hooks!

I would like to tell you a few more stories of the early days of just before my time, my childhood and growing up within the family business.

My father’s long distance driving really started in the 1940-50’s with the coach business known as Dauntsey Vale Coaches, which was then run as part of Barnes & Sons started by my grandfather which preceded the G & K Barnes Ltd business, where they operated several coaches as shown below. This was before my time, so all I have are a few photos now, but it helps me appreciate that the care I show my clients has its roots in my father to whom I owe a lot.

Fast forwarding several years, G & K Barnes Ltd also provided an RAC Recovery service for drivers that had broken down and needed transport with their vehicle to anywhere in Britain. Mostly Dad provided the service and we would often receive a phone call any time day or night with my Mother packing Dad up with provisions for a long journey ahead.

This service was initially using the Austin Westminster (Westie) and trailer and then later with the Range Rover (Rangey) as shown below with Dad.

On a few of these journeys during the late 1960’s and early 70’s, I had the opportunity to go along with Dad provided I did what I was told and it did not interrupt with my schooling. This was really exciting to me as a child and bearing in mind there was no ‘Sat-Nav’ as we call it, so we had to use a map and compass. It was during these trips that I learnt through Dad, how to navigate using these tools. It is so much easier these days!

Amazingly, during the late 1970s, Dad was able to stay in contact with our base via the latest technology called a mobile cellphone, as example is shown below - it looked much like a brick, although this is a photo off google and not by Dad! The below photo and more details on mobile phone history are available through this external link

I mentioned during my last blog that I used to frequently wander down to the garage as it was next door but one, to our family home. One of the ways I helped, was to fetch parts and tools for the mechanics occasionally from the Parts Department. On a few of these occasions I can remember Ray in the Workshop telling me to ask Godfrey for a ‘sky hook’, and when I asked him, Godfrey responded with the reassuring ‘I think you’ve been had Master Barnes’. On another occasion, Ken in the Bodyshop told me to ask Godfrey for some ‘elbow grease’. You can guess what Godfrey said - I soon caught onto questioning more what I was being asked for - a good lesson for a 7 year old to learn!

I hope I am a bit wiser these days! Anyway that’s it for this week folks.

How did this happen?

This being my initial blog, is to start a series that helps you to understand where I come from and how this passion to drive came about. I hope you enjoy reading this and that it gives you an insight into what ‘drives’ me, excuse the pun! 

Born in 1959, I was brought up my by parents in the little village of Dauntsey Lock, near Lyneham and was one of 5 children, 1 brother and 3 sisters. My father Kenneth and his brother, my uncle Gordon ran a garage business G & K Barnes Ltd in the village, which later expanded to having a garage at nearby Lyneham. So straight away you will appreciate that I grew up with cars very much being in the family and that my parents ran a family business.

As I grew older, I used to spend a lot of time at the garage, and indeed used to serve customers on the pumps where I was often told ‘fill her up with 4 star please’. In those days there was no self service, and an attendant would fill your car with petrol, check the oil and water and wash your windscreen for you as part of the service. That attendant at times was me, even though I was only a lad. 

The customer would pay me the amount I told him and I would then take the cash to the till to ring it in, going back out to the car to give him any change. My mother also worked at the garage as well as being a full time mum to us all. Mum would ‘cash up’ at the end of the shifts and balance the till as it was called. She also prepared the accounts with my father.

Eventually in the 1970’s automation started to creep in and our garage installed with BP what was called a 'note acceptor'. This meant that after hours when the garage was closed, we could let customers serve themselves petrol once they have inserted the cash amount of petrol they wanted. For this, they would have to insert a valid cash note into a tray which the machine would accept, that then released the pump for them to dispense the petrol into their tank.

This idea of serving yourself was quite slow to catch on at first and I can recall a customer at some point having tried to insert a £5 note into the door crack instead of the notes tray and shouting to the machine to actually put the fuel into his tank. I am still not sure whether he expected the pump nozzle to move itself into his fuel tank or not - it was quite funny at the time!!

As you can imagine there are more stories like this that I could share, but growing up in a family business taught me that customer care was always paramount in building a business, which is something we as a family now, pay particular attention to with every client we have.

I hope you enjoy reading this very short initial blog as I hope to add more contents over the coming weeks on this first series. I also have other ideas for future series but I will leave that for later.