‘Furlough means we won’t have to let anyone go’
Chris Jones, 62, owns luxury sock supplier Corgi in Ammanford, south Wales whose customers include Prince Charles and Daniel Radcliffe. He has a skilled workforce of around 60, so putting staff on furlough and applying for a Business Resilience Grant will help his business through the tough winter ahead.
“We’re expecting orders to be well down,” he says. “A lot of shops are saying they’re going to carry over the stock they bought last spring and couldn’t sell because they were closed.”
“We are facing a few hard months so getting this furlough money means we don’t have to let anyone go. Otherwise we’d lose skills and we can’t afford to lose anybody.”
Now Chris is optimistic about the future. “People always need socks and when they start going out more they’ll be thinking about their wardrobe and getting new ones,” he says. “From May and June we’re really expecting everything to pick up. The businesses that come out the other side will be stronger.”