Robert Clift joined his dad’s thriving ChipsAway franchise four years ago. Today the pair are growing the business even further
Proud dad Paul Clift faced redundancy before joining ChipsAway, the UK’s leading on-the-spot car repair franchise.
Within 12 months of launching his business, demand had increased so much that he needed to gear up and expand, taking on a second territory and an additional vehicle - enabling his son Robert to help him in building a strong family enterprise. At a time when so many small businesses are suffering and young people are struggling to find jobs, Paul says his ChipsAway franchise provided the perfect solution.
Bigger role
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“Robert joined me straight out of school to help with the business,” Paul explains. “He absolutely loves it and wants to take a bigger role, which is fantastic as demand for our services has continued to grow strongly. In fact, if anything the recession has been good for us - lots of new customers have discovered that a professional quality ChipsAway repair means their car looks good and lasts longer.”
Robert came on board four years ago, helping Paul to manage his increasing workload and their business has continued to grow. Taking on two more members of staff and an extra vehicle was vital in order to provide the flexibility they needed, which has enabled them to further improve their service to customers.
“Sometimes due to high demand we weren’t able to get back to our customers within 10 days of their enquiry,” Paul says. “Now we can reply to customers sooner, get through twice as much work and have the capacity to grow further on our second territory.”
Silver lining
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Paul says his redundancy was certainly a cloud with a silver lining. “From day one I had work lined up for about three weeks ahead,” he recalls. “Ever since I have always had a full diary. Reputation has spread by word of mouth and currently recommendations account for at least 30 per cent of all new business leads. My ChipsAway business is doing really well and working with Robert is great - we’re both excited about the future and growing the business even further.”
With over 300 specialists in operation nationwide, ChipsAway is the UK’s leading brand in the automotive paintwork repair market, providing high quality on-the-spot repairs to minor car bodywork damage quickly and cost-effectively, restoring paintwork in a matter of hours at a location convenient to the customer.
