Episode 7 - Martin Johnson of Wilton Technology

Surviving in business for 38 years is some achievement. Martin Johnson has not only survived that long but thrived. And now it's a second generation business as David, his son, is now evolved.  He's working with his Dutch suppliers for 38 years. Both Martin and his suppliers have a wealth of knowledge and his customers benefit hugely from this. Here is Martin's fascinating story.  

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:02

So I'd like to welcome Martin Johnson from Wilton Technologies to the latest podcast. Martin, thanks very much for joining me today.

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Thank you for having me, Neil. I'm looking forward to chatting with you.

SPEAKER_01 0:13

Likewise, yeah. And listen, I've seen you, I've been following you online, I've seen your vans around the place and so on. So I've been aware of your business for a long time. And when it came to doing uh looking for guests for the podcast, I thought of yourself and you kindly um you kindly uh said yes. So I appreciate you giving up your time. And um, so my start off if you want to tell me a bit about the company. I know you've been around a long time. So do you want to tell me a bit about the company, where you got started, and and your journey to here?

SPEAKER_00 0:40

Sure. We have indeed been around for a long time. We're about 38 years in business at this stage. Yeah, and if if the truth be told, what we've done is we've survived 38 years. That's it. Yeah. Um started way back in 88, 1988. I was selling a an anti-stit product, uh, went into Murphy's brewery as it was then, the Heinland, yeah, trying to sell it. And the guy said, What else do you supply? And I said, That's all we do. So he said, Look, there's a good agency coming up. He said for cleaning and hygiene products, which we use here, he said, in the brewery. Uh, it's a Dutch company, but there's an English agent, has England and Ireland. So he introduced, we had to make a long story short anyway. We got the contract uh after traveling over to England and to um the Netherlands as well. Oh, so we've dealt with them up to now, and we're great friends with the whole uh management structure. They come over here to us, we go over to them, and it's been a great relationship.

SPEAKER_01 1:37

Well, and it's still going strong all these years later.

SPEAKER_00 1:40

Well, well, still going anyway, as I say, survives.

SPEAKER_01 1:44

Yeah, and that's a great uh a great uh recommendation for for your business and you know the importance of relationships in business. Um, so look, I was looking at your website, and the customers are very impressive. You you like you mentioned earlier on, I think you've Heineken and you've many more names there that will be very familiar to people and multinationals and local businesses and so on. So do you want to just tell me maybe a bit about your customers and and maybe I know you've a w a wide range of services, Martin, but what might be a typical customer and what what do you supply them with? What do you do for them?

SPEAKER_00 2:17

I suppose there's no typical customer.

SPEAKER_01 2:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:20

I mean we go from the likes of the pharmaceutical to the food processing to bakeries, bars, restaurants, yeah, meat plants, schools, leisure centers, quarries. So, you know, we're inside the quarry in the muck with cement all around us, and then you're going into a food production area, yeah, with your Sunday best on. So it's quite varied, which I love because I love meeting people and I love learning about different um different businesses as well. Yeah, so yeah, I suppose going back to that, we started slowly. Um I was in the business myself, and then Claire, my wife, joined. Yeah, and eventually our son Dave joined. He he went abroad for a while, he came back and he joined us. I know he's reasonably running the company as such, okay. Very good with his wife Olivia. The background. Um, so when they came on board, really it was when we began to steady the business a bit. Up to then it was fairly hairy for the first few, uh for the first few years.

SPEAKER_02 3:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:24

Um, you might ask the question about um what was the what's the hardest part in the first one or two years, and the simple two-worded answer is cash flow.

SPEAKER_02 3:37

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 3:38

Nobody told us that it was going to be like this, you know. Okay, you buy a product in January, you might naturally sell it till March, and you've paid for it, and then you're giving 30 or 60 days credit to somebody. Yes. So it's um it was like that until um Claire came in and Dave came in as well. And Dave really been the younger uh blood came into the company, kind of said, Hold on a while now, you're giving too much credit. You're very lax with people, and they tightened up everything himself and all of you, his his wife, which was great from our point of view. We were the old stock where we know them for a long time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They'll pay in time. Yes, so they they tightened all that up. So that that made a good positive change for us as well.

SPEAKER_01 4:24

Yeah, no, that's brilliant. And cash flow, I mean, uh, you know, you described it very well thereby in a product in January, selling it in in March, and maybe not getting paid for another couple of months. I mean, that gap um is is a challenge for businesses, isn't it? But I mean, you've obviously you managed to survive it, and and bringing David in sounds great. And so I've actually worked with quite a few family businesses over the years, and um they have their own dynamic. I mean, there's a lot of positives, they have their own dynamic going on. So when you say you're in the background and David and Olivia are kind of up front, is then what's that like handing over the rain? Are the rains being handed over as we speak, Martin? Tell me a bit more about that dynamic.

SPEAKER_00 5:06

Uh slowly but surely, but yeah, yeah. Um I I think Olivia has taken me to task on a number of occasions about micro micromanaging.

SPEAKER_02 5:16

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:16

If you ever sit back, we'll do the day-to-day stuff because of the product that we use or that we sell, which are um chemicals. Yeah, there is a health and safety side to it, obviously, as well. Yeah, so I'd be involved in that in a big way with my let's say the experience that we have, yeah, and the experience of the chemists behind us, both here in Ireland and in the Netherlands as well. Yeah, we're all English speaking, but anything we don't know, they know. So I I think I'll be kept for a long time in the business. I don't see myself giving it up. Yeah, I certainly like to uh turn off the alarm clock in the morning, uh relax a bit, one they're in at whatever time, 10 o'clock, half ten. Yeah, if that's the case, or else in early if if I prefer. But it just takes that pressure off on a day-to-day basis.

SPEAKER_01 6:06

And are you starting to make that transition? Are you starting to scale back a bit? Are you still kind of is it still kind of full on?

SPEAKER_00 6:12

No, we've started to scale back in the sense of the as I say, turned off the alarm clock. So some days I'm there at nine, some days I'm there at half ten. Uh yeah, and maybe then slip away on a Friday evening earlier a Friday.

SPEAKER_01 6:26

Oh, very nice. Yeah. You're not a golfer anyway. You you go out for a walk or or whatever hobbies.

SPEAKER_00 6:33

Cy cycling, I'd be an e-bike. Oh, cycling, really. An e-bike.

SPEAKER_01 6:37

Um and something. Yeah, it's great to get out, isn't it? Any activity you get some you get some brain waves then when you're out on the bike, or I get them a walk in there. Um, sometimes um you said something there uh a moment ago. I'm just gonna go back to it because it sounded very interesting, uh Martin what you were saying about your knowledge of chemicals and so on. You've got your suppliers in Holland who have a lot of experience behind them. And I'm guessing that knowledge must be very important to some of your customers, maybe the pharmaceutical or some others. So, can you just tell me a bit about that great knowledge you have and and how that helps your customers?

SPEAKER_00 7:17

Well, I suppose it's knowledge and experience that has been built up over the years.

SPEAKER_02 7:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:22

Um, you come across a problem, uh, you cannot solve it. You say to the customer, listen, hold on, I'll be back, let me find out. And off we go to um our chemist or whoever it may be, our technical man, and uh get an answer to the question. The beauty of dealing with somebody like the company in the Netherlands is that their market really is the German market and the Netherlands market and the um the local markets around them, and therefore Ireland is only a small company to them, but they have such a vast experience of all these kind of issues that we experience here. So, more often than not, they have the answer to it. Yes, and at the end of the day, sometimes you just have to shrug your head and say, Look, sorry, can't help you, can't do anything about that. Yeah, but if that's the case, we say it straight out, no bigger. And we've we've always tried at Wilton Technology to portray a quality image uh in everything we do, whether we have a product, uh health and safety, uh, training. We do training obviously on the health and safety side of handling detergents.

SPEAKER_01 8:30

Of course, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:31

Because some of them, yeah, some of them are designed to do a job. For instance, in a restaurant, you have a commercial dishwasher, yeah, and it takes a liquid into a pump on the wall or a dosing unit on the wall. Okay, but it's caustic based because it has to be to clean the plates in 25 minutes, right? So it has to be a strong product, and as a result, it's a corrosive product which could burn you or damage your eyesight and very badly, could make you blind. So literally, people have to be trained how to use it safely, yes in all aspects like that. So there's a lot of sort of technical sides to the business that we've got answers from over the years, and now we know those answers, but we still come up against things that we don't have answers for yet, which is uh which is interesting as well.

SPEAKER_01 9:18

To go and try and find a solution where possible, yeah. And the um Martin, that you can see the whale there in the background. I'm a big fan of AD20 and and Pareto analysis and the profitability, the whales are the profitable customers and the sardines not so. Um would you have particular sectors or products that you think maybe are more profitable for you than others?

SPEAKER_00 9:46

Yes, is the answer and both sectors and customer types. If you look, we we have a very good long-standing client down in Little Island pharmaceutical plant. Yeah, I think it took me about 18 or 19 months to get in there to do business eventually. Yeah, because you have to show them that the product worker will do the job you want it to do, then it has to go through the health and safety side of it, it has to go to purchasing to get the pricing correct, it goes through everything, and it takes a long time for that to happen.

SPEAKER_02 10:18

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 10:20

The best part about that is once you're in there as the incumbent, yeah, it's very hard for a competitor to come along and get you out of there. While if you transfer that to, let's say, the restaurant business or the school business, a lot of that is based on price with the smaller customers. In other words, I think what you call the sardines.

SPEAKER_02 10:40

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:41

So they're willing to change for the sake of 20 cents per item. Yeah. Whilst the factories, they're not too interested in the price once it's agreed. They're interested in the service and if the product does the job that they want it to do.

SPEAKER_01 10:54

Yes, very good.

SPEAKER_00 10:56

So the two different types really, and we have the whales and we have the sardines.

SPEAKER_01 11:01

Yeah, absolutely. Um, very good. And you mentioned training there, the importance of training in the restaurant. And do you provide training to other customers in terms of products you supply them?

SPEAKER_00 11:13

We do, we do indeed, yeah. We supply training to um the pharmaceutical plant down in Ringiskity. Okay, one of our largest, where we might have 20 or 22 lads there. And we go through the whole um product listing, a bit on health and safety, a bit on bacteria, how bacteria grows, yeah, um, mixing chemicals or not mixing chemicals, and if you have to do it, how to do it safely. Yeah. So we go through the whole um gambut of of it with uh would you believe a PowerPoint presentation on it. If it's an overhead projector, yeah, if it's only two or three colleagues who get together, we huddle around the computer and yeah. So uh yeah, it's just an add-on to the service. I I think being a small company, which we are, we're up against some of the big internationals that come in, and we have to be slightly different. Now our products we would claim are better quality than theirs, and we do the job better than theirs, because in most instances, some of these companies who come in they provide a range of food, a range of different products, a range of paper products, and they have detergents then added on to the food business. Yeah, so really they're they're supplying on price, and we can't compete with them because their their purchasing power is just absolutely massive. So, therefore, we must be slightly different in the way we do things. So, yeah, providing the backup, technical questions, somebody gets a splash in the eye. God, what'll I do? What will I do? You know, that you're there and available to reply to them and advise them on it. Uh, and also local deliveries. We've had a situation where people have rolled us up on a Friday afternoon and said, Oh, we're out of X product for the weekend, what can you do? So there's always one of us there who will deliver it to them. Yes, and get them out of trouble. So I think that's that's where we score against the uh the large multinational companies.

SPEAKER_01 13:07

Yes. Um, and it's great to hear that because it's funny because I was only chatting to a woman earlier and she, you know, she came from an SME background to a multinational, and he was asking her, you know, the difference and so on. That's the point she was making. So I suppose you can provide that kind of service on a Friday afternoon that the larger company probably can't, and you can provide you have the knowledge to provide the training again, whereas your specialists, I suppose, whereas, as you said, it's an add-on for them. So um, and I'm sure that helps you not only get customers but keep them as well, Martin. Yeah, that that extra service and you know specialist knowledge, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:44

Yes, indeed, yeah. And I I think up to now we've been very poor with our um website. It's been there, it's static, it's been sitting there. Yeah, I think it's only in the last um week or two that our new website has come online or in the last few days, actually.

SPEAKER_01 13:59

It looks very good. We've been posting to real. Yeah, yeah, it looks brilliant, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:04

We've been posting to LinkedIn as well in the last um couple of months. Yeah, we want to continue on with that through the website and try and drive traffic that way as well. Yeah, to to go forward from here.

SPEAKER_01 14:17

So you might be kind of like a well-kept secret. Um yeah, no, that's great to hear. Um, and do you know you said earlier on about the, you know, you were talking about the first couple of years and the challenges of cash flow, and which is perfectly understandable. So did you get to a point where that started like getting a bit easier? And can you remember that point when maybe those that cash flow pressure started easing a bit, and you felt okay, we're on we're on to a kind of different level now.

SPEAKER_00 14:46

I think it was when Claire, my wife joined first, and then Dave, my son, joined um the company as well. Yeah, and we sort of got at that stage we were breaking into the pharmaceutical industries here in Cornwall, and some of the bigger uh companies like um gas networks, we supply with a product that comes in from the net the lands, and yeah, um, we we supply Heineken breweries, you know. Once we started breaking into them, yes, it then eased a little bit as the on the cash flow situation. Yeah, I think we we may have refinanced at that stage or put more money into the company to keep going on that, but all of a sudden we just grew a bit bigger, still in a situation as we are today, whereby we could do with extra bodies, which can't justify getting extra bodies, yes. Yeah, but we we grew, and certainly at that stage, then the cash flow issue eased. It has never stopped. We'll always have a cash flow situation.

SPEAKER_01 15:42

Ah, yeah, of course, yeah. Um, and your own role, and I know you've kind of stepped back a little bit, but if you can I suppose cast your mind back to when you were kind of almost you were the we call it the MD, the boss, the main man, in terms of where your time went. Um, I'm just curious, would it have been on looking after current customers, maybe uh trying to get new ones, looking after the operation side, or was there something else that would have taken up a lot of your time?

SPEAKER_00 16:13

No, I I think you've hit the nail on the head there when you say those items, and that's exactly what it was. I mean, it was looking for new customs, first of all, and then holding on to the customers you have, obviously. Yeah, and it's ironic, you know, with a large customer, a very important customer, you fight very hard to get them and you're concerned about them in your sleepless nights. Will we or won't we get them? Yeah, but once you get them, then it goes the opposite way around. You worry about losing them, yeah. Yeah, and and you have sleepless nights. Oh god, what would happen if we lose that customer? As in the way, but yes, I mean you just have to work hard on them uh and um keep them happy and keep them um satisfied with the product, pricing, delivery, service.

SPEAKER_01 17:00

Yeah. Um, and is there anything uh if a customer was let's just say if there was an issue with a customer, um how would you find out about it? Is there anything you kind of you you've been doing over the years to try and check in with customers to see, look, is there any issues? Are they okay? How would you kind of find out about it, do you think, if there was an issue?

SPEAKER_00 17:25

We we make a point in trying to see every customer at least at least once a month.

SPEAKER_01 17:30

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 17:30

We have our own delivery driver, so they're going around and they're talking to customers every single day.

SPEAKER_01 17:35

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 17:36

We do not have a salesman on the road because I'm sure you know at this stage, if you run up and knock on somebody's door and say, I'd like to see the purchasing manager, please, you're turned around and you're yeah, out the door straight away. I mean, there's a process to it. So we don't have a salesman on the road. Uh but just to answer your question, I suppose a bit of everything. I I was doing a bit of delivering, a bit of store work, uh, a bit of computing, a bit out meeting the customer, trying to get new business is always uh an interest in mine. My my background would be sales. So um, so a bit of everything, really, until Dave and his wife Olivia came along and started doing the in-house stuff, as in the um Sage work. We we use Sage Line 50 accounts, uh, and they do all the day-to-day running of um of the business. Okay, which is great. So that's that's changed for me, that's taken me out of that situation.

SPEAKER_01 18:35

Okay, very good. And it's funny now what you mentioned there is probably next time is gonna ask you about in terms of as you go through where we know, like we're the we're early June now. So, like as you go through a year, um, in terms of reporting, or um, how do you do you have any system or reports to tell you how the business is doing as you go through the year? Like you get to the end of June now. How do you know how the first six months have gone? How does that side of things work, Martin?

SPEAKER_00 19:04

If if I could explain it in a slightly long-winded way, okay. We were with an accountancy business, yeah, right? Uh double name, and very happy with them, except the prices went up and up and up. Yeah, but we were meeting every month and getting management reports every month. Yeah, we're a small company, and to do the management reports correctly, we used to do a stock take, which was a pain in the rear end. Yeah, it was literally a day and a half to do the stock take and enter it into the computer. But to get the right figure at the end of the of the period for the management reports, we used to do it. But their prices went up and up, and then we went start a meeting every two uh two months. Yeah, and in the end they were taken over by multinational English company. Yeah, and we found it very hard to make contact with them instead of coming back within a day on an email, they were coming back within three days, and at times we needed answers to questions, yeah. So we weren't getting the satisfaction that it's service we needed, okay, and also their prices were going up and up, so we decided to look around.

SPEAKER_02 20:08

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 20:09

Um, so we changed uh accountants at that stage, which was only um last year. Okay, and to answer your question, then we do quarterly reports, quarterly management reports with a stock take as well. Okay, and in the meantime, then just on stage, we look at literally on the gross product um report that you get there. You buy for A and you sell for B, and here's your profit. That's your profit margin. And it's normally within one or two digits of what the accountant would come up with. So it gives us an indication of where we are and where we're not going.

SPEAKER_01 20:43

Okay, very good. So you've yeah, you've had to make that change, but you've quarterly reports now. It says you have your sounds like you have your gross margin reports that tell you probably one of the most important figures in the business. And I suppose if you're if your overheads, all the other costs are fairly steady, you know, fairly steady, then your gross margin, your gross profit uh is probably the key figure, really, I suppose, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:07

Sure. And up to now that's the way it's been. But I mean, with this um Russian Ukraine situation, with the Middle East and Israel situation, I mean, the price of every single thing we buy, whether it be product or electricity or services, has just shot through the roof. So we're as of this week, we're just putting down our pricing to um increase our prices where we have to, yeah, because we have to have to maintain the margin. And it's not a nice job because as you know, you went out to customers and you're saying, sorry, but this is the way it is. We uh the company has to survive and it's not going to survive unless we um implement price changes. Yeah, so it's not a very nice time to be in business. Um and it's uh it's uh I won't say it's a a hassle, but it's a challenge is the word. It's it's a challenge with with Way things have gone.

SPEAKER_01 22:01

Yes. And it is difficult. I suppose the other side of it is that I suppose is in the news, every your customers probably know what's going on and appreciate it. It's outside your control. And I'm sure they have other suppliers knocking on their door as well. But um, as you said, it's still um, yeah, you know, it's not a job you want to be doing. But I suppose for your from your point of view, unless you make that change as quickly as possible uh and maintain your margins, then business then you're putting yourself in a very difficult situation as well, aren't you? And in terms of profits and cash flow, and maybe something that's not sustainable if you don't pass on those price increases.

SPEAKER_00 22:41

Yeah, and it's the it would not be sustainable. I mean, it's it's something that we have to do, and that's it.

SPEAKER_01 22:46

Yeah. So and look, I understand it's a new accountant, but sure look, I'll ask you the question anyway. You can answer, you can answer it thinking about your your newest accountant or your old one or whatever. But if there was one thing that you would have liked that they could have done or they would do for you or could have done previously, what would that be?

SPEAKER_00 23:08

I suppose it would be to give us a more regular contact and advise us of any opportunities or anything they would see in our business whereby they would say, Listen, here's an opportunity. Why don't you sell more of this, less of that? Uh going back to your whales and your sardine scenario, really. Um I think on the other hand, just to um that would depend on the cost, really. I mean, we were in a situation where we we were meeting monthly, yeah, which was certainly too much, in my opinion. Um certainly by bi-monthly would be nice, but again, it all comes back to cost as well as what can you justify, what can you afford.

SPEAKER_01 23:48

Yes, of course. Um, she was saying before that maybe if they uh a profitability analysis, I suppose, if they if they were able to get that information, or they probably might have had to do some, I suppose, some uh number crunching to get that. Is it that kind of information?

SPEAKER_00 24:06

Sure, absolutely, yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:08

Um and and see, um to be, I I won't say as a business advisor, but a semi-business advisor, because I would imagine that the accountant knows the business more than we know, he knows the figures, to see the figures. Therefore, I would imagine they're in a situation whereby they're looking at something that we don't see. So, in other words, if you look at a balance sheet or if you show me a balance sheet, I say, Oh, yeah, I know about that. But in reality, I don't.

SPEAKER_02 24:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:36

Like when you drill down further into it, I'm sure at a glance, you as an accountant are a recovering accountant, but straight away or trends straight away that I don't notice. Yeah, that's where I would like a closer contact with somebody to sit down and say, No, let's have a look at this, let's go through that. This is the reason why this is like this, and the way to get out of this is if we continue doing something else. Yes. Um, and and on the other hand, then when they see opportunities, they look this is going very well here. Why don't you capitalize on this and go chasing? I suppose, and looking at the whales behind you, go chasing more. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:14

And I suppose they, you know, uh, yeah, they would probably, yeah, Vernas. I suppose from their point of view, they probably wouldn't see that from just the standard accounts, they would probably have to come along and and crunch a few numbers to find out exactly what that is, you know. Yeah, um, but like I hear what you're saying, uh, to be more proactive, I suppose, in terms of their advice and if they could, you know, their knowledge to be able to bring their knowledge and looking at the accounts back to you as the business owner. I suppose, Martin, from my experience, most accountants don't do that, and I suppose they're so focused on preparing the accounts that they don't take the time then to actually look at them and review them. And you know, they could have other similar businesses to you where they could do a bit of benchmarking and say, look, you're a bit high here, you're a bit low there, or whatever. Um, and yeah, that's very interesting. And I mean, even just on that topic, I mean, you know a lot of other people in business, I'm sure you know lots of people in business. You know, what would you think their experience with account their accountant is?

SPEAKER_00 26:14

I would say much the same as ourselves in talking with colleagues. And um, I was a member of the Plato group for which is a little bit similar to your mastermind.

SPEAKER_01 26:26

Yeah, yeah, that's right, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:27

Uh so we had a lot of business owners there, and I think they're all much of the same thing that their accountants crunched the numbers for them, spewed out the reports, yeah. And basically it ended there. They might have given a little bit of advice or shown figures and things. Yeah. But I really feel that in the modern world, or I would like in the modern world, the accountant to be more than that, not just a number cruncher, somebody who would be a semi-business advisor as well. I as we mentioned, you know, the whales and the sardines, for instance. Yes, why don't you chase more of these? Forget about them, look at Mary Murphy down on the corner, sort. You're not making any money out of her. You might be losing money there, you know. Bite the bullet, say goodbye to her, which at times is an awful hard thing to do, but nonetheless it has to be done, and we're determined to do it as well.

SPEAKER_01 27:19

Yeah, yeah. So don't I mean uh it that's the kind of I've done a lot of that work over the years, but uh unfortunately accountants don't. Um so um Martin, uh that's very interesting. I mean, I probably touched on most of the questions I was I had down to ask you. Is there anything else um that we haven't talked about that you'd like to um talk into or have a chat about?

SPEAKER_00 27:44

Uh I don't think so, Neil. I I think um, as always, we always want help, need help. We've had a few mentors from the South Cork Enterprise Board over the past period, which we found very helpful.

SPEAKER_01 27:57

Good.

SPEAKER_00 27:58

And we all always approach them and these meetings with a blank page. We say, here's the page. This is how we do it in Wilton Technology. Yeah, and would you have a look, please, and then advise us what to change, what not to change, uh, what to do more of, what to do less of. Yeah, and and maybe what I'd love to do is work more on the business rather than in the business.

SPEAKER_01 28:21

Yeah. Um and what would that involve if you were working more on the business?

SPEAKER_00 28:27

So basically that. So uh other than that, really, no, it's it's just um getting advice from somebody all the time. Like we've been around a long time, but should we're not doing it right? If we were doing it right, I'd be talking to you from the canaries.

SPEAKER_01 28:45

Well, in fairness, you're you just survived this long, you're doing a lot of things right. And I know what you're saying, there's always um there's always some extra little bits there. Um, and like you've kind of touched on it there, but I suppose it's what there is one question I was gonna ask you. I suppose if you could fix fix one, if you could change one thing about the business, what would it be?

SPEAKER_00 29:09

I suppose through get extra people in or an extra person in. We have a part-time uh lady, a girl coming to us in two weeks' time, and she's working out her notice. And that certainly should take pressure off us, she'll be in the office doing clerical work, telephone calls like that. And at the moment we're all doing a little bit of that. Yeah, and it's wrecking our heads because we're not concentrating on what we should be concentrating on.

SPEAKER_03 29:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:36

In the meantime, so I think we're we're at a situation again whereby we need extra hands, but we can't justify uh paying for extra hands. Uh so I think that that's where I would like to be get an extra one or two people in and uh then concentrate then on the items that we should be concentrated on to grow the business in uh in a sort of a structured way.

SPEAKER_01 30:02

Yeah, very good.

SPEAKER_00 30:04

So that's it, really.

SPEAKER_01 30:05

Yeah, no, that's great, Maren. And look, thanks very much for your time. And I mean, there's no doubt listening to you, like one of the one of the big things I'm taking away from this meeting, uh and listening to you about Wilton Technologies and what you do, is what you mentioned earlier on is your product knowledge. Um, the knowledge of your suppliers in in Holland you're working with for 38 years, uh, to be able to bring that knowledge and the products to your customers is providing a massive, not just a product, but you're providing a product with knowledge. And I'm sure that must be massively helpful to a lot of your customers, that they're getting they're getting the right product and how to use it and everything else that might come up from you. So it's almost like you're giving them the product and a service all rolled into one for for kind of no extra charge.

SPEAKER_00 30:58

Yeah, I I think you're you're right, and that's what we strive, and that's what we try to do, is that we're not just selling a product, we're we're selling more of the product, we're selling a service as real, uh, really background information, health and safety side, safety data sheets for all the chemicals, all up to date. Um, we speak with EHOs, the environmental health officers, uh, to make sure that they're familiar with our products. They'll never they'll never push them because they they can't do that, they're neutral uh people. Yeah, but just that they're familiar with them and they're happy that, for instance, sanitizers, they're happy that it will do the job that it's designed to do. So I think that's that's the extra that we bring to our um to our business for our clients.

SPEAKER_01 31:42

Yeah, and you certainly do. So listen, Martin Johnson, Wilton Technologies. Thank you very much for your time. It's great chatting to you, and I want to wish you and all the family uh the best of luck in the business going forward.

SPEAKER_00 31:55

Thank you, Neil, and thanks for the opportunity of talking and to you. I follow you on um on Instagram or on LinkedIn all the time. So I always see your automobile um oh yes. And it's amazing, it always sinks in. I'm always willing to learn, and uh so um long may continue.

SPEAKER_01 32:16

Thanks very much, and uh thanks for listening and uh thanks for your time today, Martin. So best of luck to you.

SPEAKER_00 32:21

Not at all, you're welcome. Thanks, Neil.

SPEAKER_01 32:23

Take care.

SPEAKER_00 32:24

Bye bye.