Nick Cook addressed us in tongues both for 60 seconds and 10 minutes

Another good turnout consistent with a bright light sunny morning.

The Performance League

The winner for last month was formally announced as Saj Sreedharan who was duly presented with his certificate.  It is nice to see a new name at the head of the performance league.

Education Presentation

Delivered by Scott Griffiths.  He delivered important information to all Members to enable them to make best use of the EBF Website.  If you have no photograph published on the website, get one over to Scott.  Relatively recent photographs are not always flattering but you need to be recognisable.  You should check your profile page and send Scott and necessary descriptions or testimonials.  The use of these and other useful tips were given to enable members to get best use out of the website.  This is probably something for all of us to follow up on.

The 60 Second Round

Ellen Beckenham was first up and clarified that referrals to architects and builders will represent the best type of referral for her.  She slipped out early and I wonder if she was doing so in order to look for architects and builders.  If she had to speed away Marcelle Saad delivered a 60-seconds which explained how she could provide a 24 hour services for repairs, wedding rings (yes wedding rings for those hastily arranged marriages) and polishing.

John Freeman explained that not only is he snowed under but he has a bad back.  It was not clear whether the two are related.

Ben Golding is looking for people to look at mobile phone charges as a reason for joining Utility Warehouse and as usual he underlined it with his illuminated pink pig.

The Whimsey’s were both present in force and also exemplary in their whimsicality. Nick Cooke opened his 60 seconds by greeting us all in various languages which apparently did not include Serbo Croat.  He then told us of a lady from Italy who wanted advice but the Italian bit was where the house was.  She was resident in Ingatestone.  He apparently provided full satisfaction.  Alan Shaw had a positive opening by declaring that we all know what he does even if sometimes he doesn’t.  He was also rejoicing in the return of an associate who had spent 7 weeks in Majorca or, if it was not Majorca the associate knew where it was.  Brian Painter is clearly a secret Coronation Street watcher and therefore thinks everybody else is.  One of his recent subjects suffered a panic attack from watching Coronation Street.  I tend to get a panic attack from the prospect of watching Coronation Street…but we are all different. Perhaps the title, “Whimsy of the Week” should go to Allan Moller, one of its new recruits.  Apparently a recent job produced crackling from sockets, appliances acting up and the existence of two circuit breakers, which were apparently the problem.  The description “unnecessary overload” was as much a definition of the information that we were trying to assimilate as it was a problem with his client.

There was a slight divergence down memory lane by both the Mayor of Gants Hill Village, Vincent Goode (he has been doing it for 35 years) and Tina Walker who almost matched him with a very creditable 33 years.

On the back of my 6060-secondeference to the world cup and its potential effect on employers, Stuart Smallcombe of Naughty Corner fame is organising a world cup sweep stake.  The announcement that there will be amongst other things a prize for the worst performing team means we need not dread receiving England in the sweepstake any longer.

Vince Goode was standing in for last weeks Oscar Winner and he awarded the accolade to Mason Edwards, who he quite rightly identified as providing the correctly structured 60 seconds by stating; who he was, what sort of work he, did and what sort of work he was looking for. He even mentioned a July offer of discount for any new customers.  Although his presentation did not have poetical accompaniment he ticked all the boxes and the award was well made.

This weeks statistics and points of note

• 22 Members present
• 26 referrals passed
• £21,000.00 worth of business recorded
• Performance League winner for last month was Saj Sreedharan.
• Oscar Winner was Mason Edwards.

10-minute presentation by Nick Cooke

Nick Cooke was the luckily member this week and produced a slide show. Four different buildings with different problems, all of which were dealt with by our structural surveyor in chief.  One had a crack in the chimney breast and sloping floors, the second  house that was starting to sink and slide down towards the road and a third being a bungalow that was substantially extended and the relevance of steel beams was clearly paramount.  He managed to demonstrate a steel beam that not only supported the building above it but also was wind resistant to pressure from the side.  There was a fourth Illustration of the use of steel beams.  All of these illustrations were a very effective way of Nick getting over what he does and his expertise in doing it.

And so with Nick Cooke’s words ringing in our ears and an effective Referrals Round we ended what was an excellent meeting.