SWINDON has seen plenty of big-name companies come and go in the recent past, but some of its oldest multi-generational family businesses have managed to buck the trend.

A family who started out as farmers turned craft to beers and have now been doing so for almost two centuries.

John Arkell began to make a name for himself and the town in the early 1800s by turning grains into beer.

George Arkell, the sixth generation of the family to fill the role of managing director, said: “I suppose what gave us the longevity over others is when John went from farming to brewing. He bought the pub over the road, which wasn’t the trend back then.

“That gave us a really stable local base to sell our beer, the whole idea was to have local pubs to sell beer and that’s something we’ve done for 177 years.”

The Arkells first bought The Kingsdown Inn at Upper Stratton in 1843 and then just over a decade later The Carriers Arms.

Now the family are trading with just under 100 pubs in a 50-mile radius, with their eyes still set on staying local.

He works alongside his brother Alex, who is the head brewer.

Alex said: “We’ve got nine families just on the site who are multi-generational, they are three or four generations in since they started working beside us. That’s quite important to us, it’s not just about the family Arkell’s, it’s about the families that we employ, we want to be a part of the community.”

And their secret for making it work in the long run is just two things.

The first is that they ensure that what they are doing will work in 100 years' time. The second is making things better than they were by the time they hand over the reins to the next generation.

But family businesses do overcome tough challenges along the road to success.

George told the Adver: “It’s all-consuming working together because you never escape from it. It’s all you think about all the time. You’ll meet for a Sunday lunch and we end up talking about beer. The biggest challenge is probably not talking about work all the time.”

Alex added: “It’s important for everyone’s sanity not to do that, otherwise our wives will get very bored listening to us talk about the latest investment. We’re quite good at it though, we do turn off. You need to make sure it’s home time, not work time.”

A company that will be reaching the 100-year mark as we get into the new year is Blaylocks.

The Swindon shoe retailer has been run by four different generations over the last century.

What started off as a shoe repair quickly turned into a retailer for the family.

The manager of the store at Bath Road is Mark Blaylock.

He said: “You always have those difficult moments because it’s family and you have different opinions.

"A prime example is the shoe amnesty that we started this year and there was an advert in the paper. My grandpa saw it and he hit the roof because the discount wasn’t mentioned. But once we explained to him that an article was also written explaining that he came around to the idea.”

Blaylocks first opened at Cricklade Road in 1920 by Robert Blaylock, who started out repairing shoes.

Eight years later it moved to Bath Road before turning into a shoe shop.

Mark joined the family business at 14, doing part-time work but made it his career at 23.

He says there is only one thing that helps a business stay open while the high streets and shopping habits continue to change.

He said: “We’ve survived on personal service and that’s what has kept us going for so long.

“When a customer comes through the door our staff is with them until they walk back out and they even hold the door open for them. You don’t get that in a lot of places anymore.”

Shoe amnesty a success

BLAYLOCKS has been working hard to stay on the map and to get people back into shopping locally.

Its latest move was its first shoe amnesty over the Christmas holidays.

Mark Blaylock is the manager at the shoe shop and started taking donations of shoes people were no longer wearing.

After polishing them and adding new laces he donated them to shelters across Swindon for people sleeping rough.

He said: “There’s been a really good response, we’ve had lots of shoes come in.

“We’ve donated 76 pairs of shoes so far to the homeless shelter Threshold.

“But over 100 shoes have been donated overall, it’s been brilliant, it really has worked.”

Threshold is a homeless charity based in Swindon which helps people who are sleeping rough.

It recently put on its annual Big SleepOut, where people volunteer to spend the night outside.

Mark said: “It has made me really happy that people do want to help others – especially this time of year, it’s getting a lot colder.

"It does show that everybody is involved in the community.

“It just helps to get people here because back in the 60s and 70s people shopped where they lived.

“Now it’s a case of people driving 40 minutes to a big shopping centre.

"They don’t often think about shopping at local stores but I feel that is coming back a bit now.”

Shoes in good condition can still be donated in the store on Bath Road.