Description:
The trials and tribulations of running a funfair company ably assisted by my 2 partners, Laurel and Hardy
Contents:
Halloween
Our horror themed props, See HORROR THEMED PARTIES have come in handy with a number of halloween themed bookings. I am out to night in person with a horror themed candy floss cart dispensing green candy floss, so I will post some images here after the event.
I have also been roped in by my daughter to carve her pumpkin. Normally an aunt does it for her, but with her moving away its been left to me. I have to say that at 40 years of age, this is the first pumpkin I have carved, anyway an image of it is below;
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World War 2 Themed Parties
World War 2 Themed Parties
As part of our ongoing launch of themed games units we have just launched our World War 2 themed party site. It can be found at WORLD WAR 2 PARTIES As well as a range of games units dressed up with World War 2 props and themed games, we also provide staff in military uniform, digital sound effects units providing a background ambience of dog fights, air raids, marching troops and some of the songs and music from the period.
Our chocolate fountain hire business is picking up speed steadily, we are finding that the chair cover hire side of the operation has more potential than we expected. So much so that we have now added candelabras, lighting and drapes, tea light holders, wishing wells and bay tree hire to the services offered. We will shortly be launching a new website dedicated purely to wedding room decor.
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The Great British Worker
We travel up and down the M1 motorway on an almost daily basis. For as long as I can remember, a large 15 mile section of it has been plauged by roadworks. Whenever we travel along that section I keep a keen eye out to see exactly what is being done. On the last 5 trips I didn't manage to spot a single person on the stretch, and put this down to the fact that the journeys were all early morning or late at night. Anyhow the other day I travelled the road in the middle of the morning, and guess what, I spotted people. 14 of them in total which equates to less then one worker per mile! Although I do use the word worker in the loosest sense of the word, as out of 14 people spotted, 4 of them were sat eating or drinking tea, 5 of them were sat reading newspapers, 2 of them were stretched out in the back of a minibus apparantly sleeping and the remaining 3 were walking, where to I know not, but judging by their fellow roadworkers I would say that they were either going to put the kettle on, or else to buy a newspaper.
I need to found out if the company contracted to carry the work out is paid by the day, if it is I intended to buy a large number of shares in the company as I cannot see them completeing the work in my lifetime and should imagine if they have a number of similar jobs on the go then they will be employed for life.
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Bread
Over the past month we have provided something like 8000 hot dogs to 3 corporate clients. The worst part of this job has been sourcing the bread rolls. The easiest thing to do would be order them from a bakery, but we have found that one of the major supermarket chains is half the price of the wholesale bakers, so logically we have been buying from them.
Unfortunately the said supermarket chain has a bug in their checkout system which means that they cannot input multiple purchases of bread, each individual packet has to be scanned in, or as is more usually the case, a single packet is scanned however many hundred times needed to input the order. The upshot of this is that when I appear in the supermarket the checkout girls begin to say their prayers in the hope that I won't choose their aisle.
Whenever I chance upon a new checkout girl she usually wastes 15 minutes attempting to discover a method of typing in more than one packet, but eventually she will give up like all the rest and accept the inevitable!
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Back To School
Last Monday I was back at school, well not quite, what happened was I had to travel to an examination centre to sit the exam for my personal Alcohol licence in preparation for our soon to be launced mobile bar venture. I was duly placed in a little room and told that I was being monitored by cctv to ensure I did not cheat. I then sat down for a 40 minute exam which took 8 minutes to complete, although I did get 2 questions wrong so perhaps I shouldn't have rushed it.
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Whoops
We are still integrating the Chocolate Experience business we acquired into our normal operations. Until we train some staff up to operate the chocolate fountains its going to be down to me, Arthur and our respective better halves to cover the wedding bookings we have. The second round of these took place last night and went off perfectly well, except for one small hitch. The event I was at I should have been able to access the room at six thirty in the evening. As most weddings do the main reception overran and it was after seven before I finally started to assemble everything. This left me with precious little spare time to get the chocolate melted for the fountain.
I had just finished the final batch, and picked up the metal whisk and napkins I had been using and put them into the now empty microwave to enable me to carry them all outside together. Unfortunately I had not realised that I had opened the door before the timer had finished, so when I closed it again the bloody thing started back up. I meanwhile was busy pouring the final jugfull of molten chocolate into the fountain base. It was at this point that I looked through the door of the microwave and realised the napkin was now on fire! I quickly picked up the microwave to rush it out of the building, unfortunately the event manager was in the room with me so it ended up a bit Basil Fawlty as I tried to vacate the premises quickly without making it obvious I was vacating the premises quickly!
Fortunately things get better from there and this chocolate fountain work seems ever so relaxed compared to some of the equipment we are used to operating, and in the past I have not been a fan of the chocolate found in these fountains, but trying the stuff we are using it is lovely, so either we are buying good stuff, or the chocolate I have tasted in the past has been rubbish.
We have also started to invest in new chair covers and sashes, and intent to offer a complete room dressing service for weddings, with everything from bay trees to archways.
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Its A Funny Old World
Our first ever catering cart was a candy floss stall which we were asked to provide to the Coca Cola corporation for 2 events in the Yorkshire area. Within 3 years we had added something like 14 different options to our range of carts and stalls. All through this process we resolutely refused to add one particular item, a chocolate fountain. Everyone agreed they were messy, there is an awful lot of competition out there with fountains and we just plain decided we didn't want them and were not going to have them.
Well now we own a number of full sized and some medium fountains, as well as drinks fountains and a large number of wedding chair covers and various coloured sashes to tie around said chair covers. How did this happen, well we have just acquired the assets, equipment, goodwill and order book of a Norfolk based wedding company. In fairness I hadn't intended acquiring said company, I had travelled to Norfolk to pick up an item of equipment I had agreed to buy. I got on extremely well with the company owner who explained that he was having some personal issues and would like to sell the business as a going concern. After inquiring about the price and doing some sums I decided that it was too good an opportunity to turn down. He had a number of items such as candy floss machines and popcorn machines that we use anyway, the aforementioned fountains which fit in well with our existing wedding operations, and the chair seat covers which we are a little unsure about, but glancing through the order book, seem to be a popular and profitable line. What we will do with the covers is service the existing jobs, see how things go with them and then invest in building them up to compete with the other companies nationwide in that particular market if they look like a good line.
What was the jewel in the crown was the order book and the goodwill with a number of venues that provide a steady stream of work. We intend to run the business as a going concern, separate from our other operations, but obviously with opportunities to cross sell games and rides from our other business providers.
We also acquired a fairly popular website for the company, which we will release details of as soon as we have altered it to contain our contact details etc.Overall, it has boosted the order book for this year by about 25% overnight, and next year by around 250%. I must admit that I like the speed with which a business can be grown by acquisition, so we are now on the look out for a suitable inflatable/rodeo bull provider to acquire and possibly an outside bar company.
Anyway the companies website is Chocolate Experience
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New Lines For Candy Floss Crazy
In response to repeated requests from some of our corporate clients, we have added a couple of new lines to our portfolio of catering carts. Starting in November we will have a draught beer bar, dispensing various draught beers and lagers. The bar is based on one of our standard gold and white Victorian carts, to which we add a new continental draught beer system which both chills and dispenses the beer straight from the keg. This does away with the need to use a cool room to keep the kegs cold, or a bulky flash chiller and enables us to offer a bar at any venue. Although this service is primarily intended to be a draught drinks service we will also be offering the option of wines and spirits to create a complete mini bar system, further details at Candy Floss Crazy microBARS. This is designed primarily for smaller events, probably up to about 150 people. Larger events would require a full bar service, of which we will be making an announcement later in the month.
We have also just bought a range of drinks fountains, allowing us to offer a top quality drinks fountain hire service for wedding, parties and private corporate events.
This takes our current catering carts options up to around 17 different carts. More than enough to cater for almost any event.
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The Eternal City
Rome, The Eternal City
After realising we had a 4 day slot with only a handful of events booked, I decided to take the family on a short break to Rome. Its been a while since any of us had time for a holiday, and this season seemed to have been non stop work so we deserved a break. Rome has the reputation for being one of the most impressive cities in Europe so I was expecting something out of the ordinary. What I found was a mixture of the good, the bad and occasionally indifference, this isn't meant to be a holiday review so I will summerise what I liked and disliked about the trip.
The Good
History I don't think there is anywhere else in Europe that you could walk along a street of relatively modern buildings, turn a corner and be confronted by a 2000 year old structure, and not just the once, but time and again, Rome seems covered in ruins (although I use the term loosely as some buildings such as the Pantheon are pretty much intact).
The statues and fountains by Bernini or Raphael are utterly breathtaking. A visit to the Vatican or the Sistine Chapel and the wealth of treasures on display are equally awe inspiring.
Entrance Fee Discounts Most all of the public museums and monuments have a policy of allowing under 18 year olds from the EU free entry. If you are lucky in England you might get a discount for kids, but I wouldn't bank on it.
Discounted Rail Fares When buying two adult tickets on the Italian rail system, a child of 12 or under was allowed to travel free of charge.
The Italian Rail Service Rome's train operator is the first one in Europe I have travelled on that actually makes British Rail look good. The first train we approached, the conductor closed the doors as we reached it and wouldn't let us on, I thought this might have something to do with making sure the trains run on time, but as no other train managed to turn up at the allotted schedule this obviously wasn't the case. The next train that arrived had most of the doors out of order, so it resulted in a panic as the crowd of waiting people were forced to run up and down the platform trying to find a door that opened, we made it this time, but many again fell foul of the system where the doors are arbitrarily closed and the train leaves irrespective of whether anyone is waiting to board.
Lack Of The Nanny State When visiting the Castle De Sant Angelo, a prominent notice warned visitors to beware of the uneven flooring and steps which were original and dated back to the time of the Emperor Hadrian. In this country the castle would either have ot be closed, or the floor would have to be ripped up and replaced in case someone tripped up and sued. There were many similar incidents, and surprisingly we did not see a single fatal accident whilst we were there, surely without our all encompassing Health and Safety Gestapo the people should have been dropping like flies.
Air Conditioned Hotel Rooms The temperature was a steady 38C whilst we were in Rome, air conditioning must be a prerequisite for living in a country with temperatures like that.
Swiss Air We flew out with Swiss air, a budget carrier which puts Sleazy Jet and Ryan air to shame. We were fed, watered, given chocolate and the kids on board presented with a selection of toys and games to occupy their time, all fairly inexpensive touches which would put them well in front of the other low cost airlines in my order of preference for future trips.
The Bad
The Vatican We are constantly told by organised religion that we shouldn't aspire to worldly possessions, why then does the Vatican Cities display wealth and splendour far in excess of what any European King or Queen would be allowed to get away with in this day and age.
Roman Traffic Lights The first evening in Rome I was amazed by the amount of drivers who, when we were stood on the pavement at pedestrian crossings, stopped and waved us across even though the traffic lights were still on green. I thought at the time that they must be the most considerate drivers in Europe. What I didn't realise at the time, was that in Italy you stop at a green light and go at a red light, as we rapidly discovered when we walked across zebra crossings with the traffic lights at red, and had to dodge the lunatic drivers swerving around us. I think it would be an idea for this strange traffic light system to be more widely publicised to prevent visitors being run down.
Speed Of Your Average Roman I have often maligned our fast food outlets in the UK for the speed (or lack of it) of their services. After experiencing the Roman equivalent I now realise we operate at warp speed in this country. I walked into a Burger King, which had 4 separate tills open, 6 staff serving, and 8 people in the queue. After 10 minutes the queue had not altered one inch and nobody had actually been served. The amount of historic ruins in the city initially had me thinking that the Italians must be far more respectful of history than we are and more culturally sophisticated. I have since realised that the reason there are so many ancient ruins, is because the construction workers in the city haven't got around to demolishing them yet, and given a few centuries more will probably have them flattened.
The Heat At a steady 38C during the four days we were there, Rome is just too bloody hot in August. I don't like blisteringly hot weather at the best of times, but trying to walk miles around a city and clamber up and down the 7 hills of room meant that we spent a fortune buying bottled water at ridiculous rates from local street sellers.
The Indifferent
The Population The locals were a pretty miserable looking bunch. Sure if you asked for directions they tended to help you if they could, there was none of the contemptuous look and ignorance you would receive in say Paris at asking a local for help. But equally there was no sense of pleasure either. Ask for directions in Holland, or Scandinavia and the people seems to genuinely enjoy talking to you. In Italy they just seemed, well, indifferent.
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