Memories of community and entrepreneurial flair

John Chidlaw is MD of facilities management company Unita Maintain Ltd. John, aged 38, left a successful career with a major support service company to launch Unita Maintain in Handsworth in 2012 with wife Emma and an investment of just £5,000. Another director is now on board and the firm works the length and breadth of the country on six-figure contracts. It employs 442 staff from Scotland to the English South Coast. John and Emma have four children between them, aged from seven to 17.
By The Newsroom
Published 1st Sep 2016, 07:00 BST
John Chidlaw is MD of Unita Maintain Ltd, a facilities management company. He has written next week's Favourite Things feature for the Sheffield Telegraph and one of his choices is Hillsborough Park.John Chidlaw is MD of Unita Maintain Ltd, a facilities management company. He has written next week's Favourite Things feature for the Sheffield Telegraph and one of his choices is Hillsborough Park.
John Chidlaw is MD of Unita Maintain Ltd, a facilities management company. He has written next week's Favourite Things feature for the Sheffield Telegraph and one of his choices is Hillsborough Park.

Shiregreen

I moved there from Hillsborough when I was seven with my mum and three sisters when my mum and dad split up. I loved living in a really friendly community with woods and fields close by to play in. Our house was 26 Butterthwaite Road and I made friends with lads who lived from Number 18 up to 32, where Matt Barton lived; I’m still friends with him today. Most of them, in fact. Shiregreen gets a bad name nowadays which is a real shame. When we lived there it was a nice place to be. All my sisters live there – I think it still has a strong sense of community.

Grange Golf Course Thorpe Hesley

Our gang used to go to up Grange Lane and sneak through the woods onto the golf course in search of golf balls. We sold them back to the golfers at four for £1. It was hard times at home and we kids had to find ways of making money. I believe 100 per cent that’s where my entrepreneurial ideas were honed. I would make £10 a week on the golf course, and I had a paper round. When I finished, I would buy Micro Machines in a pack of five for £2 at the paper shop, then head off to school to sell them individually at 80p a time.

Malin Bridge

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This place is where I rekindled things with my dad for a short time. I hadn’t seen much of him after he and mum split, but at 14 we got in touch. He had a garage at the side of Hutchinson’s Motors. Every Saturday and Sunday for three years I would work with him. He trained me up to be an auto electrician. It’s the only time we got close. Each morning I would walk to Valley Cafe around the corner to get us bacon and egg butties. The irony is this cafe is now owned by my friend Simon Parkin. It’s called Big Si’s Cafe. I go regularly and still have the same butty, but I don’t see my dad any more.

Shardlow’s Working Mens Club, Ecclesfield

A guy took me on as a glass collector when I was 15 after I’d cheekily shouted to him in the street asking if he had any jobs. I worked from 5pm to 10pm on a Sunday night for £10 and it was very hard work – Shardlow’s was always packed. My mum and sisters walked to meet me when I’d finished my shift and on our way home I always bought my mum and sisters a takeaway from the Chinese on the corner of Ecclesfield Road next to Harrod’s Caterers. It used up my entire night’s wage, but it was our family treat.

Hillsborough Park

I met my wife Emma eight years ago. We had both come out of relationships feeling emotionally bruised and neither was looking for love. Particularly me – I had an estate agency struggling in the recession and a daughter of two I wanted to see as often as possible. But without us knowing, friends had put our profiles on the dating website MySingleFriend.com. When our profiles matched, we were forced to contact each other. And I think I fell in love at first sight. On our second date we had gone out for a meal and it seemed too early to say goodnight. We couldn’t go to her house because her parents were visiting. And I was living at my mum’s. So we went to Hillsborough Park and sat on a bench. We talked until 4am and have been inseparable ever since.

Pulse, Vogue and Hotshots nightclub, Attercliffe

This place doesn’t exist any more, I think it’s now a computer company. It was where I spent some of the best years of my life – and learned how to become a good manager. After all the ‘experience’ I’d gained at Shardlow’s, I went to work as a glass collector at Roxy’s in Sheffield and when I heard about Rank Leisure’s posh new club in Attercliffe I applied. I was appointed glass collecting supervisor with 29 staff under me. I was only 18. I ended up assistant manager by 21. It was a brilliant time, even though I have never drunk alcohol.

Beck School, Shiregreen

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My first real memories of being at school are from here. I loved that place. The friends I made are still my friends to this day and there were some good teachers. I will always remember our sports teacher Mr Bocking, who was the first one to see potential in me. He decided I was good at football and got me into Sheffield Boys, where I played for two years.

Related topics:MemoriesHillsborough