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the business , the staff , and our customers . This approach creates an environment where people genuinely enjoy coming to work and contributing . This philosophy is absolutely key in everything we do . It impacts every aspect of the business ; once that goes , everything else would follow . As a result , many of our customers have been with us for 15 to 20 years , including some of the first customers I acquired when I took over the business . The same is true for many of the staff ; this has served us extremely well .”
Exponential growth
Having such strong foundations can make the difference when significant challenges arise . Darren explains how the company managed to turn the most challenging circumstances of the Covid pandemic to its advantage . “ Before the pandemic , things were ticking along nicely ; we had a good rate of growth , and everything was moving in the right direction . Then , when it hit , 90 percent of our customers closed overnight . Of course , we still had all the costs associated with running a business with a turnover of £ 20 million . We utilized the furlough scheme and made arrangements to pay our landlords after the pandemic . Because of our strong financial position going into the pandemic , we had assets we were able to sell . At first , we were losing £ 20,000 a week , but we were confident that we could survive . We have an extremely capable finance director who was able to shield me from the stress enough to go out and fight in any way I could to generate more revenue . “ Thanks to these difficult commercial decisions , we were able to stay open five days a week while our competitors were not . We stayed open for our customers who pivoted to home delivery or takeaways . We also set up a home delivery service that brought in around £ 20,000 a week . The local community really appreciated this ; it was even featured on the news a few times .
“ Another brave commercial decision we made during this period was to invest in fresh produce . A very well-known fresh produce
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