Greetings from Affinity Park Sheffield.
Hope you had a wonderful Easter!
Last week I was in quarantine , a peaceful cocoon like, quarantine in a hotel room at the Kenwood Hall Hotel in the leafy suburb of Nether Edge Sheffield. I reminded you about Rodrigo & Jess's back story (if you didn't know) and also their new baby; Freda. Rodrigo & Jess would like to thank all many people who sent them lovely messages. You can read that newsletter here.
I had paid extra for a test-to-release kit, which was supposed to enable me to emerge from the cocoon after five days rather than ten. But Easter got in the way, the result was slow coming. And.. so in the end it was day 9 anyway before the email arrived and I was liberated. A little bit frustrating, I was a little tempted to go AWOL especially since I have my own lateral flow kits and tested myself.. in any case a friendly police lady came knocking on the bedroom door to remind me about the £10,000 fine and a possible ten years in prison.. erm yes that was a good deterrent.
On Tuesday morning leaping from the hotel like a spring lamb I was FREE.. Tomas picked me up from the hotel and we went on the grand update tour of AW..
If you are new to this newsletter - I have been writing it every Friday, from wherever I happen to be.. for over nine years.. the first was from Thailand during Chinese New Year 2011.. You can scan a selection of old blogs here.Over 73,000 people subscribe to this newsletter, all customers and fellow giftware traders - Here I tell you the trade secrets, the gossips, the adventures and mishaps. You will meet Ringo our agent in Indonesia, Mr Chatterjee our man in India. Coco our agent in China.. and of course Tomas (product and marketing wizard), Raul (IT wizard), Katka, Rodrigo and the whole team from the UK. Join me as I travel and work.. and feel free to email me your ideas and suggestions, over the years the readers of this blog have really shaped the direction AW has taken.
It's almost six months since I was last here.. that's hard to believe. When I see long standing members of the AW family, it's like no time has passed. But when I look at what has been achieved, how things have changed - I can't help but feel proud of the team.
First stop to Parkwood where Dusan (brother of Tomas and now boss of AW Aromatics) has been working incredibly hard installing new production lines, training new artisan producers and making the place buzz like a bee hive. Still struggling to meet demand but in the last six months production has more than doubled, so that's quite an achievement. I was happy to see lots of new faces and be introduced, this is a bigger achievement as we grow our AW team/family.
The three warehouse units there are now fully utilised and it's becoming clear we will need more space soon. Regular readers will know about the fire last year that burned down our main warehouse block, they are due to start the main construction soon. To coin a phrase, our landlord, Keith is building back bigger and better. When it is finished, we can either reoccupy or sublet or a bit of both. I have one plan in mind (thinking big) where we take it all back.. but this would need Keith to build to our specification - so I called him up to see if he was happy to invest in our dreams. Sure he said, but can we meet at your affinity Park site? I'd like to see it.
After the morning at Parkwood, Tomas and I went across town to Affinity Park. Now the entrance is via electronic gates which recognise your car reg. As the gate opens the first thing you see is the famous AW Buddha - backdrop to many group pictures at AW and sole survivor of the fire.
Inside I see much has changed, the 6000 bay pallet racking is complete, and more importantly again many new faces. We are still working from a kind of home made office area, so the next stage is to make a beautiful work area. I have a mission to make all the work places from Indonesia, to China, to Spain, to Sheffield as pleasant as possible. A good working environment means a better place for us to care for our customers. It's the same mentality as taking care of yourself so you can care better for others.
As they (used to) say in the inflight announcements: Secure your own mask first, before assisting others.
As humans sometimes I think we confuse self sacrifice and unselfishness above everything. Obviously good things, but you need to care for yourself first in order to do the other.. in business it's the same (if and when you can afford it). So this is the dream office.. I don't know if it will work like this but we are sure going to try..
Then Keith and his wife (and co director) Gill came to visit. We gave them the grand tour of Affinity.. and then sat down to discuss the future rebuild at Parkwood.
Keith & Gill have been amazing landlords, they gave us huge emotional and practical support after the fire, even turning out at 2am to help Tomas cope on that dreadful night.
People often say to me.. why don't you own your own warehouses? Well my thinking is slightly different to MST (mainstream thinking). At AW we are in the business of making and importing beautiful things and supplying them to lovely retailers (like you). That's our business to focus on - NOT the property business. Best to focus on what we do best and let the experts like Keith & Gill do what they do best.
Too many (non-MST) thoughts for one newsletter!!
Take care, stay safe, have a great weekend.
David
PS: The shops are re-opening soon in the UK.. we have deals just for you.. see below..