Pride and Joy is open for business

Jane Phillips, managing director of Pride and Joy tells us what she has been doing during lockdown and is looking forward to the future... starting with her reaching the final of the Everywoman in Transport and Logistics Awards. Awards ceremony takes place 6th October.

We have now been back part time for the last 2 months, the new normal is 3 days a week shared between the staff, social distancing and doing whatever needs to be done that day…last week we packed and despatched 50 boxes of uniform.

Its been a strange time and I chose to keep super busy to keep my mind off the possible outcome of lockdown and an overnight loss of our orders.

As many of you know I have always supplemented my lack of sales drive by taking an interest in you all and getting to know my market place, you laugh at my coach polishing on Blackpool seafront with a prosecco in my hand or my NEC Monkey Shoulder with Bus & Coach Buyer shenanigans, or my holding court at the NEC when we are having a late in the day gathering over something fizzy but I think I am talked about for the right reasons.

I have tried to do my bit, I joined the trip to Honk for Hope London as I felt that I needed to show the support of Pride & Joy, I arranged a meeting with two parliamentary transport committee members, my local MPs Robert Largan and William Wragg along with and some well respected industry faces and grass roots local operators to try and get our professional passion heard.

Behind the scenes Pride & Joy stock was cleared to make aprons, wash bags and face masks co-ordinating help from a fantastic community, which kept my mind off the daily worries of collecting money, paying suppliers and my staff and their health and well being.

One of few smile moments for me has been reaching the final of the Everywoman Transport and Logistics award, the email took my breath away and I was overwhelmed by the application submitted by one of my team and the supporting documents from two of my amazing female work colleagues. I didn’t get to see the application until after its submission and was super proud to read about how I am perceived for just being me.

I am now looking forward to joining the virtual awards evening from the comfort of my settee with a glass of something and a takeaway.

Anyway this ends my personal note, I truly hope that you have all kept super safe and well, and that you are adapting to a day to day ethos as we can’t plan beyond a few weeks at the moment at least getting the schools back is a box ticked but as we all know its only our bread and butter..we need to get those wheels moving 7 days a week.

Take care and keep super safe everyone and I look forward to years of laughter, gossip and creating memories.

Jane

Tags: covid crisis, coach crisis, new normal, uniforms, transport, coach transport, tourism, community, coach operators, embroidery, small business,