Warehouse Operative
Spicers

David C

00:00:02 My name is David C. My job title is a warehouse operative and my day to day thing would be to pick stock to send out to our smaller warehouse which will gradually go off to a customer. We have, like, stock transfer notes commonly known as STNs and you get your note, go and get the stock, stick it on a pallet, wrap it up, stick it on the loading bay for the loaders to stick on the lorry for the RDCs.

00:00:28 I had quite a few friends at school and weren’t really that interested while I was there because I was more concerned about after school. So, I was going to join the Army and get on with that. And I was in the Army for about a year and a half after I’d left and I got administratively discharged because I was injured which is I had a broken jaw so I was not allowed to train for I think it was up to nine months. I went on with a general job working at Marks & Spencer’s and then I came to Spicers from there.

00:01:02 My Dad was in the Army for I think it was 10 years so that gave me the actual thoughts about going into it. I thought it would a great experience, a great way of growing up. I was a Royal Logistics Corps Driver. It was quite hard, it has, the physical training of it and the mentality from, I went in when I was 17, so I wasn’t totally matured and I had no discipline whatsoever, but I was a better man when I came out of it.

00:01:31 Yeah, I do miss like the sport part of it and I miss all my friends I used to have there so I haven’t seen them in…well since I left about two and a half, three years ago. Now I’ve got a small family, I’ve got my girlfriend, I’ve got my son. I’ve got to think about them more than anything at the moment. So, I’m not sure but I very much doubt I’ll go back into it.

00:01:56 Just after I left the Army I started working at Marks & Spencer. The manager there was actually ex-military as well so me and him got on quite well together and it made going into a civilian job a lot easier than what it could have been.

00:02:14 Originally when I came here I was on late shift, I was working one o’clock in the afternoon to nine o’clock in the evening but this was just after my son was born so I weren’t seeing enough of him. By the time I finished work at nine o’clock, get home for half nine, he’d be asleep. So, I wasn’t seeing enough of him so I had to change shifts so I could have more of a life with my son.

00:02:37 Leaving school I was immature. I went into the Army, it give me my discipline and my, like, drive to actually get on and I’ve worked hard in this place and I’m still currently the warehouse, like, record for picking. A general warehouseman in, like, the night they’d pick in between 140-160 lines. Now, I work three hours extra and I’d done 402 lines which was…come out 56 loads which is enough to fill a lorry by myself in one night.

00:03:14 My main hobby is scuba diving. I’ve been to Phuket in Thailand to do quite a few different courses. But it was a one off thing when we were on holiday and we thought it would be a laugh, just went straight into the first course and we’ve been doing it ever since. I’m currently a master scuba diver which is the highest recreational qualification you can get to and next year I’m going for my first professional course and I’m hoping I’m moving on in that as well and becoming a diving instructor and hopefully before it’s too late, become a course director, which I’ll be able to run my own dive school.

00:03:46 What I’m hoping for in sometime near future is promotion, going up to a job that involves more than just the warehouse part of it. You know, I’m hoping to follow in my Dad’s footsteps and he actually started here as a warehouse office where I am and he’s now the day shift manager. ENDS