We hear stories all the time from our consultants about what can be found down the back and sides of our customers furniture, everything from money to false teeth!

Here are just a few:

Having sold a customer a set of Decra covers for her Parker Knoll recliner and matching chair and sofa, I began measuring the Recliner. On completing most of the measurements, I started checking out the tucks. No gap between the arm and the seat, but £1.90 in change (passed back to the surprised customer). Turning the chair around to take a photo I noticed a lump in the fabric flap, I pushed it in thinking it was where the scatter had been sitting against it, only to find it pushed back out and was very solid. Time for another dig and poke, watch off and down the back of the seat we go to find a pink hot water bottle (cold of course). “Ho!” the lady said, “I thought the grand kids had taken that.”

About 15 years ago, and in an upstairs flat of all places, I found a tortoise in the customer’s sofa bed!!! Needless to say the customer was thrilled to bits as she had noticed that the tortoise had not gone to sleep in the box in the airing cupboard for its winter hibernation and that it had escaped but had no idea it had taken refuge in the sofabed.

Last summer I visited a top floor flat in a nice new block at the request of a local estate agent on behalf of the landlord. I met with a young man who was the current tennant. Across the whole width of the lounge was a very expensive looking glass tank for some kind of lizard I presumed. I wasn’t too phased by this as lots of people keep them as pets and I don’t really mind them. Oh no it’s not for a lizard said the nice young man it’s for my amethystine python. My brains, vocal chords and legs all stopped working simultaneously as I then realised the tank was empty. The tennant obviously noticed I had gone a whiter shade of pale and said “oh she’s out at the moment, do you want me to put her back in”. Paralysed with fear all I could was nod my head frantically. Little did I know an 11ft snake was basking behind the settee by the radiator – apparently her favourite place. He quickly put her back in the vivarium as if it were nothing.

Why not let us know what you’ve found?

I always feel writing for a blog can be quite time consuming particularly finding inspiration of what to write about. However it helps working for a company that has been going for over 45 years as there’s usually a wealth of resource to plunder.

Which is why I’ve been reading all the back-copies of the Plumbs company magazine. Not only did I find some great stories I’d like to share with you but the accompanying photos have given me a great laugh, showing early nineties hair-styles and fashions, much to the embarrassment of some of my colleagues.  Here’s one photo of a young Laura Calvert, Joanna Whitworth & Sarah Page.

In particular, I came across a section called “Amusing Anecdotes, Hot Tips & Facts”. Any staff member who contributed to this section was given a box of chocolates, so as you can imagine there were plenty received.

Here is one of my favourites, which was sent in from a consultant:

“I was showing a customer fabrics when the telephone rang and she left the room leaving me with her parents, who were a quiet couple. However, I carried on talking about Plumbs Covers and fabrics trying to encourage a response. My questions and statements only drew blank looks. After about 8 minutes the lady returned and listening to my chat, smiled and informed me that her parents neither spoke or understood English!”

More to come…