Tinpot Alley

Here’s a little job that we’re currently on with at the moment. It’s for an assortment of 27 zintec planters to be painted matt black for a garden archictecture firm down in London.

If you’re wondering who the guy is to the left lacking a posterior, it’s Matt.

They’re due to go for painting some time this afternoon.

We received the enquiry just before Christmas and sent them a sample once they were happy with the quote.

Stay tuned for pics once they’re finished!

We got these pictures sent ot us of a pair of elongated bespoke stainless steel planters we fabricated for the Sheraton Hotel down at Heathrow Airport.

Here they are at either side of the foyer as you walk in.

Here’s one of them from the front.

Here’s one from an angle. (Although I’m sure you can see that for yourselves.)

And here’s one from the other side.

I hope these pictures give you some idea of the scale of the things as I don’t know the actual sizes.

Considering stainless steel photographs so appallingly as it tends to show up every single mark and fingerprint, I don’t think the chap who did these has done that bad a job.

Not too long ago John and myself had to deliver a house-load of tall hexagonal stainless planters to a certain footballer who currently plies his trade in the Premiership. Or, to be more exact, the reserves of a certain Premiership club.

We aren’t ones to drop names into converstions like your average drunk would drop an alka seltzer into a pint glass the morning after the night before. And besides, the vast majority of you won’t have heard of him.

In one of my prevoius incarnations as a furnishings emporium proprietor just over ten years ago, I remember both Stuart Ripley and Graeme Le Saux popping into my establishment one afternoon after training as we were located just round the corner from the Blackburn training ground.

It was round the time of Uncle Jack’s millions and either just before or after they’d won the Premiership.

Some of Jack’s millions well spent - finally.

Anyway, after Stuart Ripley had managed to cause an effect similar to a partial solar eclipse after turning to the right whilst browsing the shop window and I’d stopped mentally singing: ‘If Ripley plays for England, so can I’, we managed to build up a bit of a rapport with Mr. Le Saux and counted him as a bit of a regular. We also had to pop round his gaff once in a while to do certain bits of work.

At the time, Blackburn players were probably some of the best paid in the land and, whilst Mr. Le Saux had a lovely pad in Waddington, it didn’t have the equivalent of a plasma screen in every room, a pool table at the top of the stairs and a grand piano in the foyer.

It’s quite apparent that even second string footballers at second rate clubs are paid infinitely more than those of a not too distant yesteryear. But then again, you knew that anyway.

Oh, and when was the last time you saw a full safety net in place for a trampoline at working class kid’s house?

Well now I’ve managed to completely alienate the footballers’ wives portion of the market, it might be quite nice to see what shape swimming pool Rio Ferdinand has.

{Next week: How Freddie Flintoff shotgunned a planter-load of Lancaster Bomber]

I’ve well and truly learnt my lesson about spouting my mouth off, counting chickens and all that palava after the many disasters that have befallen mostly me to be fair.

Things like:

The Canary Wharf Garden Show. (Rubbish, sold bugger all and half-wrecked the hire van.)

Free photo shoot in Gardeners’ World. (They took the photos but never told us that the planters weren’t going to be in, but we still told all and sundry to buy a copy. (All and sundry then laughed at us.))

Planters on the telly.(Rushed around like loons for a paltry link from the Channel 4 website.)

Those three things are the ones that stick in the mind, but there’s one or two other things that also crashed and burned.

And the one thing they had in common?

I bleated mercilessly about every single one. I’ve become so convinced that any prior mention on this blog renders a project useless that I’ve decided to stop doing it so I don’t put a hex on anything. (I must be more superstitious than I let on.)

So, it’s with a certain amount of relief that I can report we’ve finally been approved for a NeedIT grant to invest in computer stuff and e-commerce.

This means that we’ll have a far better computer setup and we’ll finally be able to trade properly online and show our full product range as opposed to leaving it to your imagination.

We’ve spent enough time now with a computer that’s more tempremental than your average menopausal fishwife; it also has to be said that we’ve been awfully slack with things like brochures and other offline marketing efforts aswell - or at least that’s the conclusion me and John came to in the pub after six pints of Kronenburg. (You really don’t want to know of any conclusions drawn after that.)

It also just so happens that Robo-bender Matt and Deadly Derek have finally sorted out the press tool to make up square planters without the need to get them lasered. I think we might just have the production side screwed down. (More on that another day.)

It obviously would’ve been bloody marvellous if we’d sorted out the grant and the tooling before the spring/summer as opposed to afterwards, but the point is it’s sorted.

I’d also recommend using your local Business Link, who were extremely helpful and efficient in doing our micro business review and sending us down the right path.

For designer stainless steel for your designer home, it has to be said that you can find all sorts over at Trendir. There’s still some life in that old stainless steel dog yet.

It’s not that I have a current thing for sinks at the moment, but here’s another that’s made from 16swg 304 stainless.

I do like how they throw the grade of stainless out there like a badge of honour.

They’re doing us a great favour by raising public awareness.

We regard 304 stainless as being a bit of a middle ranking stainless; it’s not as expensive or high a grade as 316, but it’s not nearly as cheap as 420.

We make most of our planters from 304 stainless as it looks the same as 316 and won’t cause you any real problems unless you’re leaving rusty spanners on them and you live on Blackpool front.