60 years ago people were going crazy over The Beatles in America and BBC2 starting broadcasting. This was also the beginning of Anglia Locksmiths.
It all began when my late father Ray Ward had a small decorating shop in the middle of The Fens in a small market town called Wisbech in Cambridgeshire. By chance, an American tourist, Fred Patterson, came into his shop asked him why he hadn’t thought about cutting keys and becoming a locksmith like himself in America. This was the start of a long-term friendship as Fred taught my father via sending him many lessons, locks and keys from overseas. As he got more confident, the shop turned from being a painters and decorators into an old-fashioned ironmongers and locksmiths; renamed to Anglia Locksmiths.
To this day people can come in and buy one screw, one hinge or one picture pin rather and it also makes stock-taking very interesting!
All through my childhood I grew up in the shop environment, having to work on Saturdays and during my school holidays cutting simple cylinder keys and dealing with the public. At primary school, we were asked to write a story about what we did during our school holidays. I did a vivid account of going out with my father and breaking into this enormous safe and when my teacher came to mark this obviously she thought that I was being forced into a world of crime and immediately went to report it to the headmaster. Luckily the headmaster knew my father and whenever I see her, she always has a good old giggle about it. This safe was also memorable for me as it was full of Green Shield stamps; which my father took as payment. For many years, if I ever wanted a new bag or trousers or whatever; I would have to spend the weekend tearing, licking and sticking these stamps into a book to get them!
When I left school, my father took me on under the YTS scheme where I earned £25 a week. This was on old fashioned apprenticeship where for the first year all I was allowed to do was watch and learn and any mistakes I made ended up with a rap over the fingers with a screwdriver or similar tool.
After this, my father’s health deteriorated with Alzheimer’s and Glaucoma and so I was very suddenly left at the deep end to run the business along with my mother. House repossessions were at their peak in the 1980s with three or four a day and I had to learn very quickly on my own. I often felt very lonely and wished I had known other locksmiths for guidance but it was years before the mass training courses, internet forums and DVDs were plentiful etc.
One of my ambitions was to join the MLA but with having to run the existing business and not confident enough on taking the exam it was a matter of self-learning and studying problems for myself and overcoming them. Eventually I plucked up the courage and passed with flying colours and then went on to make Anglia Locksmiths an Approved Company too,
During the 1990s, I went into key cutting big time; building up a stock of over 18,000 blanks and starting our 100% guarantee which still stands today. If ever we cut a key, and it doesn’t work, I will go out personally for free and get the key working. Most times the lock just needs lubricating and the odd time a little tweaking but with this guarantee it shows our customers we are dedicated to giving them an excellent service which no-one can match around us and at the same time putting a good reputation behind our name.
Also in this time, I remember turning up at the shop one morning and seeing someone asleep in my doorway – handcuffed. He had been out on a stag do and had been waiting till I opened my shop to free him from his misery; obviously all of his mates had abandoned him!
During the 2000s, we began to see the start of the two/three-day locksmith courses and many tools readily available off the internet. Competition was getting fierce with part-timers undercutting prices all the time as well as the start-up of all the national call centres. This was the time I needed to have a good look into what areas we could evolve into to try and make us stand out from the crowd.
Utility warrant work was on the increase; as we all know, with a drill anyone can open a lock, but this was what I wanted to change to make us really stand out from the rest of the new start-ups and joining the ICL seemed the perfect solution. In all my years of trading, I feel this was my most important decision I have ever made. Not only with the friends I have made, the regular meet ups and training I’ve had, but with the many things I learnt which I didn‘t think were possible before.
In the last five years of doing warrants, I can still count how many locks I’ve had to replace on one hand. Again it was only a couple of months ago I opened a Chubb 3J60 with the RB Curtain pick in less than five minutes. I was gob smacked and the warrant and gas engineer couldn’t understand why I was making so much of a fuss about it.
Out of all my tools I find my homemade bump keys are used the most and are my favourite. These work on nearly all of the cylinders I come across and are less than a one minute opening. Since Covid, I have decided to no longer do any of utility warrants; it was a lot of time wasted sitting in the van.
For many years I grew up with the impression that other locksmiths were always competition, but the ICL and the MLA have proven me wrong and I feel that any trading full time locksmith should be part of an organisation.
Most days are now taken up by running our website which supplies locksmiths across the world with bump keys, key blanks, obsolete locks and tools as well as keeping an eye on our Facebook group with over 3,000 followers. We also offer in-house training.
My mother Wendy has also passed away now so myself and my wife Sara have become the new partners to move Anglia Locksmiths into the next chapter. I feel confident on leaving the shop to be run by Sara, Mario, David & Rosie.
Mario is from Poland with previous experience cutting and programming keys back in his home country is mainly on the bench, while David (my brother in law) drives our second vehicle and does most of the local emergency work, Rosemarie (my sister) handles ordering and pricing up ,whilst my wife Sara sorts out all the admin and paying the bills! I have three wonderful children Aimee (27), Casey (26) & Ashleigh (23) who all seem far too clever to be stepping into my shoes!
Over the years I have built up quite a large collection of old warded keys, padlocks, church locks etc but my prized ones are keys from The RMS Titanic, Sandringham House and The Bastille. I am also a collector of old carpentry tools, including wooden planes, spoke shaves and coopers’ tools.
One important thing I am having to learn after all of these years is how to try and balance work and family, as for many years I have been ruled by my mobile phone. I never realised how much stress this can cause, and luckily with David also on the road, I can now turn it off.
A few years back now I was in all the national newspapers for just one day as I had apprehended a shop lifter and held him for over two hours in my shop. Eventually I had to put him in the works van and drive him to the Police station. It turned out into a far bigger story than I could ever have imagined and the publicity we received was a bonus too.
We are incredibly grateful to our loyal customers, dedicated employees, supportive partners who have been integral to our success throughout this remarkable journey. This anniversary signifies not only the years of hard work and determination but also the immense potential that lies ahead as we continue to strive to be the best at what we do.