The Swaledale Cheese Family

Just to bring you up to speed, I own a business called Swaledale Cheese Company (it does exactly as it says on the tin!), and I run it with the help of my kids and a great team of people. However, just before Christmas an expansion vessel in the water system of the factory burst and flooded the whole place. All the computers in my office went kaput, and it shorted the electricity. Of course, to store cheese you need to keep it in temperature-controlled rooms, and what do you need to keep the temperature controlled? Bloody electricity. So, when we came in after the weekend, we found not only the office resembling a swimming pool, but all the cheese (over a hundred kilos to be precise) beyond help.

Since we’re a cheese company, the requirement to have cheese to sell comes as recommended, so I’m sure you can understand how devastated we all were!!

Anyway, the Christmas break was spent hunched over paperwork and cradling G & T’s, trying to sort out what we were going to do. I went to see accountants, solicitors, bank managers, anyone who could give me the push to fix it all, but really it was my family and friends who helped the most.

When all the team returned to work after Christmas, I tried to send them home again, since no factory meant no cheese to be made. But the stubborn lot refused to budge, and began helping me with the massive clean-up process – I couldn’t have been more overwhelmed with gratitude.

We’ve managed to clear most of the debris and mess now, and this week we’ve finally had some professional cleaners in to ensure the factory is up to hygiene standards. It won’t be long until we can start making my cheese again and I can’t wait!

So, I’ve done what my kids have asked (I’ll tell you more about them soon), and begun writing a blog on my trials and tribulations. All I need now is a few more entries, and a few more readers (so far it’s only family – at my insistence…), and I’ll finally feel like a real techno whiz!

P.S. Below are some pictures of the now spotless factory, and our new reception desk! Hopefully won’t be long until there’s cheese filling those clean shelves….