EFFECTS OF THE CORONAVIRUS ON A SMALL BUSINESS - DAY 15 (31/03/2020)

The bedlam carries on at Contact Left today, although as I have mentioned on previous posts peoples buying habits have changed, the fact is they are still buying, we can not print the volume of air rifle targets that people want and although we hold good stocks we are now printing them to order. The printing arm at Contact Left is in 2 parts with a separate company owned by Sean who is the Manager at Contact Left and although he is solely in charge of the day today running of Contact Left he works mornings and evenings on SG Print and Design work. At 21 (Or 22) he has the stamina to do both. On a serious note if anyone needs any printing let him know he does all sorts from banners to business cards and has some really good contracts with restaurants and has done a lot of work for military units due to the cross over from Contact Left.

Back to the Bedlam of today, after the Police paid for the MoD order that was put in yesterday the MoD are on our backs again needing to know timings for when the items will arrive, needing to know whether they will need fork lift trucks to unload or whether the company delivering them will have them, It’s a bit new this to me, although civilian street tends to work quicker than what I remember while in the military it definatly doesn’t have the tenacity the MoD is applying here. I sent a screen shot at 1630hrs with details of the consignment but didn’t follow it with a phone call and by the time the MoD planner called me this evening we were unable to get in touch with the company delivering so not exactly sure what time it will be delivered tomorrow. It’s a school boy error on Contact Lefts behalf but one we will learn from.

I am not privy to any information at the moment but the way it looks is the MoD are deploying to different parts of the country, I would imagine to help with logistical tasks etc and I think we must have done an alright job so far as this afternoon we received another call from a different planner in a different area wanting the same product, nothing firm on this however when I was on the phone I mentioned we are selling the hand sanitiser and they ordered 2000 bottles straight away.

On the manufacturing side, the slings that we have been making for the Police are just about finished, I had a bit of a row with the head of manufacturing as I was sure I was right about a type of material, as normal I was wrong but sorted now. The manufacturing side is the safest area we have as right now people want UK manufactured products but with minimal staff it’s a nightmare for them to complete all tasks and with us short staffed elsewhere we cant move anyone in to help. So far we have about 5 outstanding Police products to make and we are still getting orders through from shops to stock the UKOM products.

The last day of the month is always good for sales and today was no different but I just cant help thinking this has got to stop, the money wont be there for people to spend to soon, it’s a false economy, I don’t believe we evolving quick enough and we cant until we get staff back that can help us, its not the type of job that you can just bring anyone in and they can do it, it takes months to learn how we operate and even now the lady who works from home is furloughed because it’s an impossibility to do the job while looking after a child, even with us supplying the Police and MoD the nursery the child attends has closed. So its just get on and cope with COVID-19 the best and safest way we can.

Thanks for reading David