Seriously festive

Managing Director of serious** abandoned his family and presents on Christmas morning to help out a Lichfield pub that was threatened with closure because its drains were full of sewage.

David Birkett, Managing Director of Serious Waste Management in Burton on Trent received a call from the Fradley Arms at Lichfield to say that the special lunchtime festivities were in jeopardy because of problems with their waste just as he and his family were about to open their presents on Christmas morning. As part of the national chain, "Spirit", formerly the Scottish and Newcastle Pubs and Restaurants, the Fradley Arms use serious** as their expert waste consultants.

Aware that none of the drivers were available, David Birkett jumped into a tanker and drove through Staffordshire to meet an engineer on site to resolve the problem.

"I’d just welcomed my mother who’d driven from Yorkshire to join us to open our presents with the family when I got the call," said David. "I couldn’t bear to think of all those people not able to have their Christmas lunch so there was nothing else I could do.

"We emptied & cleaned the pumpwell, the pumps & associated pipework so that all was functional; short of alarms going off initially, which heralded our being called out, no-one knew we were there. Coincidently we found a blockage elsewhere on the site and cleared it. I returned again the following morning to check everything was still functional. We’re a family business and we take our responsibilities very ‘seriously’!" he added.

The landlord of the Fradley Arms, Linda Johnson said: "We couldn’t believe it when serious** said they’d be round straight away despite the fact it was Christmas morning. We were able to carry on to give our customers the Christmas lunch they were all hoping for.

"It saved our bacon…well, the turkey actually!"