We’ve hit number 50 on our list of the greatest things we make here, so I thought it would be nice to share some of my favourite moments, as well as your most replayed clips.

Since we started The Factory Next Door, we’ve spent hours and hours hanging out with business owners, chatting to them on factory floors and in their offices.

They come from different walks of life, creating a wide range of beautiful products.

But there’s a unifying factor that comes up time and again in our chats. An element that is repeatedly identified as being crucial to success.

Family.

Mum, Dad, Brother, Sister, Children – they are often credited with direction and drive. Even when they are not employed by the company, we hear about their influence on business strategy.

We start in the city of Gloucester – and close to its beautiful cathedral sits the shirt-maker Emma Willis (Ep. 21). It’s a company that makes shirts for royalty, actors, musicians, as well as for injured service personnel through its Style for Soldiers charity.

In this clip, Emma reveals where her company’s strong sense of societal responsibility comes from.

For our second clip, we travel to Walthamstow, North London. Here, Han from Black Horse Lane Ateliers (Ep. 24) is explaining to us why he pivoted from making clothes for high street brands to launching his own label making the very finest jeans.

For the final clip, we go back to the beginning, to the custom motorbike (Ep. 4).

For this episode we went to hang out with husband-and-wife team Vic and Lin from Destiny Cycles – makers of the finest choppers this side of the Atlantic.

In this clip, Lin discusses her pride for Vic’s work.

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We’ve hit number 50 on our list of the greatest things we make here, so I thought it would be nice to share some of my favourite moments, as well as your most replayed clips.

Our manufacturers are undoubtedly facing strong headwinds. Many business owners tell me it’s tougher now than it’s been for decades.

Despite this, on our travels around the country, we’ve met a few extraordinary people who have decided to face the challenge head on and buy a factory.

In this compilation, we begin in Stoke-on-Trent, where we met the wonderful artist, Susan Rose (Ep. 41). Before asking her why she’d recently taken-over a pottery – I wanted to know from the previous-owner Tony, why he was exiting the family business.

In Ep. 30 we met Paul Jacobs. He lives in the Netherlands but spends a lot of time in Sheffield these days. Can you remember why he bought scissor-maker Ernest Wright?

For our third clip we stay in Sheffield, with Buffalo Systems – which makes outdoor clothing.

Having just bought the factory, Ben Fogle and James Sleater (Ep. 42) invited us along to have a look around, but before asking them why they’d bought the brand – we wanted a quick gossip with the team.

Say hello on Instagram @thefactorynextdoor

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We’ve hit number 50 on our list of the greatest things we make here, so I thought it would be nice to look back at some of my favourite moments from the show, as well as your most replayed clips.

Over the coming weeks, I’ll share a few compilations.

We’ll start with moments that hit me hard.

The Factory Next Door might be about manufacturing, but it’s also a love letter to people making things in our communities; people who have stories to share.

In this compilation, we begin on the Isle of Wight, at the RNLI’s factory making inflatable lifeboats (Ep. 23). Who would have thought the name of a boat would leave me choked up?

In Ep. 37 when I sat down with Merry from Border Oak to ask why she does what she does, her love for her dad caught me completely off-guard.

Finally, we have a clip from Ep. 46. If you want to manufacture things in Britain, your company must show extraordinary resilience – but when I started my chat with Naomi from lingerie company Edge o Beyond, I had no idea about the personal resilience she’d brought to her brand.

Say hello on Instagram @thefactorynextdoor

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.