Endless houses, a budding entrepreneur and Donald Kirkham

My first two years after school – part one

I left school in 1969, without a single qualification, and without a word of protest from either one of my parents. There was no such thing as a graduation, we just went to school, stayed until lunch time, and left, that was it, education finished and the wide world awaiting. Never a word was said regarding further education, or getting a job other than the one I was going to, which was working with my Brother Gordon as a property repairer. Gordon had left the fire service sometime earlier, not surprisingly he did not take too well to following orders, he went to work for Michelin, the new ‘place to work’ in Burnley, big money and good benefits. But Gordon enjoyed being a handyman and do-it-your-selfer, he had the itch to be self employed. So G.D.Kirkham property repairer came into existence, and when I joined it soon became G.&D. Kirkham property repairers. The name is self explanatory, we repaired property, anything from hanging backyard gates, repairing roofs, interior painting and decorating, to installing windows. We were the typical do anything people that we are now advised by TV home renovation programs to avoid!

But we did it, driving around Burnley in an ex-war land rover, that finally gave up the ghost and was replaced by a light blue ford transit van. The van had only one seat for the driver so I would sit on a milk crate in the passenger side. Anyone who knew Gordon knew that he drove like a maniac, how we were not killed I have no idea, every time he got behind the wheel he must have thought he was still driving a fire truck, we would career around corners as if lives depended on it, one did, mine! We had the cheapest set of ladder racks we could find, flimsy things sold as ski racks, (ski racks, in Burnley?) Now that tells you something about the quality of these things. Tied on to these we had at least one pair of extension ladders and various planks that made the transit a fast moving rocket launcher. On more than one occasion Gordon would squeal to a halt, and everything stopped moving except me and the milk crate who hit my head on the dashboard, and the ladders which would hurtle ahead and fall right off the van, “well at least we don’t have to lift them down”, he would say with a grin.



what a machine!



My favourite job at the time was stone painting. Around this time the houses in North West Lancashire were undergoing a transformation, they were being painted. To bring a house back to its former splendour, people with money would sandblast the stone, this removed a century of soot and grime restoring the stone to its former brilliance, and they looked good. The trouble is sandblasting was expensive, and invariably removed (blasted away would be more accurate) the cement from between the stone so the house had to be ‘re-pointed’, again a job I loved. My 15 year old entrepreneurial juices were flowing, I immediately saw that if we painted one house, we should be able to paint the rest of them in a block by offering a group discount. I suggested this to Gordon but was rebuffed, “don’t be stupid lad, one at once that’s enough, who do you think we are?”. So we did, to this day you can see rows of terraced houses that have been stone painted, in different shades of ‘stone’ each house looking like a block in a coloring book. One dark, one light, one bright, one has ‘tinting’, darker stone paint added to replicate the natural coloration of trimmed stone. Needless to say most blocks of houses now looked ridiculous. How the council allowed it I don’t know, you can’t do anything now without planning permission, yet anyone was allowed to alter the outside aspect of the house they lived in, I believe to this day that the rot that has overcome areas of Burnley started with this ridiculous fad. The classic example of Jack and Vera's house (they named it 'the rectory') in Coronation street shows what they looked like!



what a mess! a sandblasted house surrounded
by two stonepainted houses



Re-pointing for me was a dream, minimum outlay, the amount of cement used was small, time consuming but that was OK we charged by the hour, the more hours, the more money, and easy. All you had to do was remove any old cement, then carefully replace it so that it was straight, and looked good. I could re-point one terraced  house in a day easily, then the money came in and Donald was a happy camper. Except, Gordon had a heart of gold, he would help anyone he could, for the rest of his life it was one of his traits, if you needed help, call Gordon. All it needed was someone to say they thought the bill was little bit high and the bill was cut in half, barely covering costs, we worked like dogs some weeks and barely covered our expenses, but Gordon was never bothered by this, he was helping people who could not afford to pay. Me, I was having palpitations, I wanted my money, all of it, pay in instalments I suggested, charge interest, anything, but lets get our money.

Even at 15 I saw the potential of being in business, but then who listens to a 15 year old? I worked with Gordon for two years, and during that time learnt business lessons that have helped me throughout my life, both in my corporate world and in my business world. Give good service, provide good quality services or products, make a profit, but, always get paid!