Mafia Strike At Smoke Control

The Mafia has moved in on a growing smoke control company near Cardiff – and are making the staff offers they can’t refuse.

The word on the street is that violin cases, sharp suits and initiation ceremonies are the order of the day at Smoke Control Services, nestled in the sleepy valley of Tredomen, South Wales, as the family muscles in on the act to build a business empire.

Already one member of staff has been promoted to Capo and a new “soldati” has joined the ranks to make sure the business runs sweet.

Capo de Tutti Allan Meek, eyes narrowed under the brim of his trilby, explained all.

“We brought in the Soprano-style family idea recently after we’d reached a plateau in sales. We wanted to make our engineers more entrepreneurial and kick start growth,” he said.

“The basic idea of our Mafia is that once an engineer reaches a certain level of orders, he can take on an assistant to help him. The Mafia bit is that the Capo keeps a share of the sales bonus of the new recruit in return for managing and developing him, in the same way that the Mafia soldier pays a tribute to the boss.”

The family has already grown with the arrival of new engineer Lee Hewings from Dutch partner and car park ventilation specialists, Novenco. He was recruited as a result of engineer Rob Davies being promoted to Capo under the Mafia structure.

Lee has a wide range of experience in the building services industry, spending three years as a Technical Sales Engineer with Midlands-based Novenco, developing the company’s customer base, proposing and costing car park ventilation schemes, and supervising their installation.

Prior to that, he worked for six years with Eastwood Air Conditioning in Birmingham as a mechanical installation engineer, before being appointed workshop and installation supervisor, overseeing work on sites and taking responsibility for the manufacture of components to customers’ requirements.

“So far, so good,” said Allan. “The Mafia connection has certainly given everyone a great incentive and they’re really enjoying it as a bit of fun – although Lee hasn’t heard what’s going to happen at his initiation ceremony yet!”

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