Ambassadors

Jamie has been in butchery for 23 years and left school at 14 to work in Clays of Kettering which he now owns. Jamie has one ethos; “Progress and Be Successful” he loves getting up for work every day. He preaches to staff about excellent customer service, making sure they have one to one contact and about going the extra mile - he wants his customers to come to the shop for the whole experience and leave happy.

Joe and Steve head up the butchery at successful farm shop Taylors. Steve has been in butchery for 38 years, starting out as an apprentice and then buying his own shop at just 21, running it successfully for 15 years. In 2005 he joined Taylors as their first full-time butcher and helped them go on to win Farm Shop of The Year in 2015 & 2017. Joe grew up on the farm and has been hands on with the business since it began – he has since become a skilled butcher and integral in the outstanding growth and expansion of Taylors farm shop over the last 10 years. Both Joe and Steve are always looking for ways to innovate and expand the business, putting their success down to a willingness and understanding of the need to change with the times.

Steve started in butchery 45 years ago at the age of 16 cleaning up after school at ER Hughes in Liverpool and then became an apprentice learning all aspects of butchery. From there he owned 9 different shops in the Liverpool area and has been in his current shop in Knutsford for 17 years. The thing that Steve believes makes him successful is making sure he keeps up with the food trends and adapting to what the customer wants. He is a big advocate of presentation & quality and wants his customers to have the best experience when they come into his shop.

James started in butchery 21 years ago after a serious injury playing professional rugby at the age of 19 for London Irish which cut short his career. His next obvious step was to go into his Dad’s wholesale meat business where James started to deliver meat & bacon to café’s, and then opened his first shop just outside of Shepperton supplying restaurants and catering businesses, where he used to supply the restaurant of Marco Pierre White. James stayed in this shop for 15 years and then bought a bigger shop and his trade moved from Wholesale to Retail Butchery. James joined the Q Guild and was soon winning awards such as Best Traditional Sausage in the South East and representing Great Britain in the Tri Nations Butchery Competition in 2014.

Tom started working on his family farm and slaughterhouse at 14 washing up and went into butchery at 16, firstly working in George Alpes butchers, then moving onto Bowland Foods, and finally Huntley’s Farm Shop in Preston where he became Butchery Manager. In 2015, Tom applied to join the Great Britain Butchery Team, where he was very successful and went on to become Captain until 2018 when he opened his own shop. Tom says that being passionate about what you do, approachable, giving customers what they want, having new & fresh ideas & moving forward is important to being successful.