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JIM MAKER H


e left school without any qualifications or ambition other than to be a hard


working farmer but Kingswear entrepreneur, Jim , went on to make a fortune running several highly successful businesses.


During his business career which went from launching a steam cleaning business to running four limited companies in the industrial field and becoming a director of the Newton Abbot-based Midas Group, Jim somehow managed to hide the fact that he could not write to all but his secretary.


He was branded ‘thick’ by bullies during his school years, which he says were ‘hellish’ but unbeknown to Jim or anyone else, he wasn’t backward, just dyslexic. Sitting in the lounge at Home Farm, where three generations of his family have lived before him, Jim, 67, explained: ‘Nobody ever talked about dyslexia, nobody ever said to me you’ve got a learning difficulty.


In


those days you just left school thinking you were stupid.’ Just like his maternal great- grandfather, grandfather and father, Jim was destined to become a farmer at Home Farm, or so he thought. After leaving school at 15, Jim was working full time at the 87-acre Home Farm (which today extends to125- acres).


‘I always wanted to be a farmer. My great grandfather, Tom Bulley, was here in 1875. When the owner, Mr Seale Hayne, sold up in 1904 my grandfather’s brother, Charles Bulley, bought the farm.’ The farm passed to Jim’s grandfather, William, who he describes as ‘quite a character.’


‘In


1947 when he died there was no money and my grandmother, Blanche, was forced to sell the farm to the


KINGSWEAR FARMER & ENTREPRENEUR


Jones family and we moved back as tenants,’ he said. ‘I grew up here as a potential farmer, I was put on the tenancy by Mrs Jones when I was 21.


‘Education gave me nothing but living on a farm gave me the ability to work hard.’


Nine years after starting paid work at Home Farm, Jim was still earning just £2 a week. ‘Dad didn’t know much about wage increases and it got to the point where I simply wasn’t earning enough money to go


“Education gave me nothing but living on a farm gave me the ability to work hard.”


and play, so I also jobbed around the local farms driving tractors and milking cows.’


The changing point in Jim’s life came in 1967 while he was working at Newton Abbot stock car track, where he met speedway promoter, Trevor Redmond. In the same year he met his wife, Louise, who he married in 1969.


As Jim wanted to earn more money he began working part-time for Trevor running stock car events in Newton Abbot and Cornwall.


In 1970 Jim became a director


of Trevor’s company, Auto Speed Circuits. ‘Meeting Trevor gave me an awful lot of confidence. He believed in me where nobody else did. He would leave me in charge of running the whole show.’


During this period, Jim was also busy building up his own companies starting with a steam cleaning business in 1969. He ended up


owning four limited companies under the umbrella of Makers, all of which involved the cleaning and protection of buildings, plus a 50 per cent share in another firm, Maker Coatings, with friend Colin Bower. Aware of his own limitations, Jim was able to accept and appreciate help from others throughout his career. ‘My inability to write was, in the early days, supported by Louise and so it didn’t hold me back. I was able to overcome my shortcomings by other people’s ability to do it for me. I think that’s been the thread of my life throughout – the help I’ve got from people. I have been successful because I have been aware of my limitations.’


Perhaps because of his self- awareness and a knack of knowing what makes people tick, Jim was able to spot the strengths of potential employees and gave them free rein to develop their skills. In this way he attracted highly skilled staff and kept their loyalty by giving his regional directors, who headed his four regional offices, 20% of the net profit to share among the staff. Jim said: ‘We took on a lot of highly motivated staff that wanted to prove their own worth in an organisation that actually gave them a sense of ownership.


‘Because I had good staff behind me it gave me the ability to look for new activities in our business which always put me one step ahead of the competition. You’ve got to have quality people around you and I had top quality.’ Top quality to Jim did not always


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