Darkness came well before the eclipse

01 January 2000 by
Darkness came well before the eclipse

Lincoln was in the area designated to witness 90% darkness during yesterday's much-vaunted eclipse, but I have to tell you that darkness descended over Lincoln - more particularly Waterside South - a couple of weeks before that.

Why? I hear you cry. Simple. Heather - who was destined to return from maternity leave on 6 September to save the long-suffering Susan from her accounting nightmare - is moving away and so will not be coming back after all. Subcontracting the work has proved to be a bit of a fiasco and so we will now have to try to hire our own account administrator from scratch. Twenty hours a week, flexitime, working for a lovely fella. Any takers?

I'm sure that many of you consider Nottingham to be a smallish provincial city, but when you live and work in a rural area like Louth, it could be thought of as a large cosmopolitan metropolis, full of major brands and bustling streets. And so it was to Nottingham that we took our managers for an away-day to see what the big boys are doing.

How do they advertise? What do they sell? How are they decorated? And so on. It provoked much discussion as to how we might be able to incorporate the best of what we saw into our own restaurants when we refurbish in January.

The main bookshop in Lincoln has just spent a fortune refurbishing the premises and has installed a Costa Coffee on the first floor to entice customers to linger longer in the shop. Maybe we could devise some sort of scheme to generate additional income? I know: why don't we start selling books and, while we're at it, we could try selling crockery and cutlery as well?

It appears that the company which was spearheading the redevelopment of Scunthorpe town centre has been the subject of a takeover by another developer. Rumour has it that shopping centres might not fit the plans of a new owner and so it's possible that the development may be delayed yet again. It's just over 10 years since we were first told that our property was going to be demolished to make way for a new centre and we're still there.

Last summer, we invited the team to our house for a barbecue. It worked very well and so we have done it again. It's unfortunate that there are always people on holiday at this time of year. But the evening was enjoyed by those who attended it.

JOHN DOWNS is managing director of Lincoln-based Jay-Dees Family Restaurants

Next diary from John Downs:16 September

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