When the coronavirus pandemic first hit, Tom Punter’s plumbing business was only nine months old.
But TP Heating Services made it despite all the adversities and owes its success to the locals who supported it in a challenging year for many small businesses.
With the lockdown, Tom responds mainly to emergencies and rushes to fix broken boilers or diagnose why someone’s heating is not working.
He makes it very clear that he likes to talk to his customers during this difficult time. When the first lockdown began, he tried his best to help and even offered to do some shopping for his customers.
Tom’s partner Jae Bennett leads the TP administrator, including bookings and social media. She says the personal side makes it so fulfilling.
“As we go through the winter, breaking a cauldron feels like an essential service. There might be an elderly person with no heating or hot water and we would go out and fix it asap.
“If someone really needs our service in an emergency and you can simply help them, I think that is the key for me. It does something that you know will help someone.
“One thing Tom really loves is spending time with customers.”
Tom worked at British Gas for almost ten years, starting as an apprentice and working his way up to a technical engineer.
But he wanted to work for himself and set up TP Heating Services in June 2019.
Your customers have been a great source of support and have left a lot of positive reviews on their Facebook page.
Jae says the lockdowns encouraged people to shop locally.
She said: “I think it is very important for everyone to support local businesses. Everyone knows someone who owns a small business and wants them to succeed.
“It’s great to be a small company right now with people supporting us and how everyone is getting behind everyone else with the lockdown right now.
“Hopefully that means for other small businesses as well.”
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