Staff

In 1975, our premises were at 171 Stourbridge Road, Holly Hall, just a hundred yards from our first shop (at 169), and only a few minutes from the much larger building (an old car showroom, that at various times in its life had been a chapel and a butchers, complete with its own slaughter house), that we would move into in 1979. There were only three other full time members of staff, Colin Malin and David Hale, who ran the 8mm, library and sales and Steve Wellings who handled the 16mm library. The 8mm bookings were dealt with by a part-timer, Ron Hillman, who came in weekday afternoons. Within twelve months a further two staff members were added, Mark Rackham and Gary Brocklehurst.  However when we moved to 99 High Street, Dudley we added to the staff at an alarming rate, there were  around 16 or more being employed at this branch by 1987, many of whom were employed in the Derann Video Library. Opened in the mid 80’s the video library went from strength to strength and was the by far the largest in the area, with an enormous range of both VHS and Beta tapes. I was unable to keep tabs on the staff in this department as they changed so frequently. The new premises was also my new home until I was able to buy my own place in 1981, as Derek was good enough to let me turn his office into a bedroom. Derek decided, at some point in the 80’s, to take on Dave Worrall, who handled all the publicity, advertising and prepared the artwork for the magazines, catalogues, newsletters and the 8mm labels until his departure. He now produces and edits the successful Cinema Retro magazine, as well as having written the glossy volume entitled ‘The Most Famous Car in the World: Complete History of the James Bond Aston Martin DB5′, which can fetch well over £450.00 on ebay at the moment. The names Steve Morris, Dale Hemenway, Paul Foster, Mike Dimmock and Duncan Macleod will be familiar to most of you, the last three names being the final members staff to be taken on in the 8mm department, staff in our other departments had a fast turnover but that wasn’t the case with film. Mike would now travel with Derek, while I would take over Dereks role when he was absent. John (Johnny) Thompson took on the role of head electrical engineer until his departure around the middle of the 90’s, dying of a heart attack a just a few years later.  Names in other departments would mean little to you, but there have been three Grahams’, a  Vince, Kevan, Simon, two Martins’, Peter, Daryl, Wendy, Marlene, John, Matt, Andy, Nick, Barry and two Marks and as many again in the video library. As I’d said at the start of this post, 99 High Street had been many things to many people, it was three storey building, but we quickly filled each floor starting with the ground floor and working our to the top. The rear of the shop, had been the service department of the car sales and there had been an inspection pit and it took years to get rid of the smell of oil. Dereks’ eldest son Steve occupied the top floor with his own business for a number of years, but we soon filled that space when he moved into his own, larger premises.