Nick Padley has been appointed as a Director of New Covent Garden Market wholesaler P&I Fruit, joining Paul Emmett and Paul Bishop on the Board of the group that includes P&I and Side Salads. Nick began his career in the Market as a porter 23 years ago, aged 19, before becoming a junior salesman at Side Salads in 2011. Since 2018, he has run Side Salads and now steps up to oversee the entire firm in the Market. We talked to him about his route to his new role.

Nick was born and raised in Harlow, Essex, and followed his great grandad, grandad and father Bob into New Covent Garden Market. “My dad wasn’t in the Market his whole life, but he was a porter at P&I towards the end of his career,” Nick says. “The real family roots though were on my mum’s side, as her dad - Bill Watson - and grandad - also Bill, were both Covent Garden porters their whole lives.

“A lot of my extended family were porters over the years too, but I didn’t come straight into the Market. There was an element of the older generation not wanting me to follow them in because of the unsociable hours I suppose, but as soon as I’d been to the Market with my dad I kept bugging him. I’d studied for accountancy qualifications, but I knew the money was better in the Market and I didn’t want to be stuck in an office. I helped dad out a couple of Saturdays and from the first time I was up there I just loved the buzz of it, the fact that everyone else is asleep while we’re working.”

Nick entered the Market in 2002 as a porter, on ‘odd work’, which meant he reported to the union office every morning and was assigned work with whichever firm required his services on that day. “I was a porter for a bit longer than I wanted to be, but it gave me a great grounding,” Nick says. “My dad wanted me to get in with him at P&I and knew how well the firm treated its staff, but there weren’t any jobs available at the time. So I had to earn my reputation. That was important, as once you are established here, your reputation precedes you – good or bad. If you work hard and people get to know you, they take you seriously and want to employ you.”

Opportunity knocks

It was when P&I Fruit bought Side Salads in 2011 that Nick’s opportunity arose. “Paul Bishop and Ian Taylor had always encouraged me, but when they bought Side Salads, they took me on as a junior salesman,” he recalls. “A few people came and went as you’d expect and I started managing the stand around 2018. From day one, I worked under Paul Bishop, who obviously told me how he wanted things done, but also gave me an open book to put my own stamp on it. He encouraged me to try new things – even if nine out of 10 new lines had failed, but one was successful, I always had his support.

“One of the main reasons P&I bought Side Salads was that they recognised the quality and value behind the G’s brand that was attached to it then and is still a very important part of the business. What we’ve always been about, and always will be, is looking after our suppliers. You’re only as good as the growers you’re working with and their willingness to listen to you with an open mind and work with you. As long as everyone understands that we all have to make a living, there’s enough in there for everyone if we work together,” says Nick.

The strong relationship with G’s saw Side Salads start programming prices across the English season for the first time as the firm recognised there was a demand for that service. It now does that with other English and international suppliers too. “G’s was always the lifeblood of the stand, but we’ve added several product lines into the mix and developed our relationships with growers like Portwood Asparagus, for example, and select brands from overseas.”

Changing trade

As the trading environment at NCGM has evolved, particularly post-pandemic, the amount of Side Salads’ business done online or by phone call or Whatsapp has increased to roughly 80% of the total, by Nick’s estimation. That has in turn changed the salesman-customer dynamic, he says. “A lot of the time, the customer is not going to see the product until they receive it, so we can’t send them poor quality product, or advertise that we’re selling one thing and send something different. The trust would soon break down if we did. They have the same time and staff pressures as us and we’re all working to a tighter schedule now, so a big part of my job is to give them as few headaches as possible.”

Trading hours have condensed and might be drawing to a close in Buyers’ Walk by 3am or so, but that’s not the end of the working day by any means. Nick is on the phone to suppliers and customers on his way home and once home, continues that flow of conversations for a few hours more. “That’s what wholesalers around the country are doing – we start at 9pm or 10pm and they might not start ‘til 4am, but we’ve got to feed our service into the customers at the time they want it,” he says.

In the grand scheme of priorities, quality comes ahead of price, but service is also a key part of the equation. “We’re always aiming for consistency. Having good products is important, but having good staff is huge. I always want my staff to be polite and obliging when someone walks onto the stand, which is not always a given in a market at 2am! It’s not just the sales team, but the boys out the back too – you’ve got to care about people, whether they are your customer or not.”

Natural progression

Nick’s progression to Director was not exactly planned, but it is nevertheless a position he has been working towards. “I always had a view that I wanted to be involved in overseeing the business,” he explains. ”I’ve learnt the trade from the bottom up and gone through the whole card of roles really, dealt with every supplier and customer, the hiring and firing, and so now I’m looking forward to getting more involved at the top end of the business.

“Side Salads and P&I have always had a blueprint on how we deal with things. We like to look after our staff; we want them to be happy and have a smile on their face because without them we don’t have a business. Doing nights is hard enough without trying to do it in a poor environment. We have high staff retention, which I think says a lot.”

Nick’s two brothers, Josh and Bob, also work for the firm, as well as cousins Bill and Sid. “Working with family is good because you know you can always rely on them,” Nick says. “Sometimes, it makes the family social scene a bit of a juggling act, but you know you won’t let each other down.”

Nick has long had other people's longer term career paths in his mind. “I knew where I was trying to get to - the hours and the hard work were part of that. It’s not set in stone for any of us at P&I, we just do what needs to be done. So when we’re busier, we’ll be working six days and when it gets a bit quieter, we’ll do a bit less. I’ve had 18 and 19 year-olds come to work for me who really liked the job, but just couldn’t get on with the hours. So maybe that will change. If they were working say 5am to 2pm, and not a mandatory six days most weeks, more people might look at it as an option as they’d still get a social life. On the other hand, the traffic makes a big difference – coming in late evening and leaving early in the morning lets you get in and out of London so much quicker. If you switched to daytime hours, that becomes more of a challenge, but maybe using public transport is an option then.”

Pauls "pleased and proud"

In a joint statement, Paul Bishop and Paul Emmett said: “We are very pleased and proud to appoint Nick as a director. He has worked his way through the ranks showing tremendous commitment, dedication and hard work and it’s been a pleasure to work with him along that journey.

“While we are both still very much involved in the management and strategic direction of the business, we are not physically in the Market as much as we used to be and Nick will run the company at New Covent Garden on a day-to-day basis, as the face of P&I on the ground.

“Nick is extremely well liked and respected across the Market and he’s the future of the firm. We wish him all the very best in his new position and look forward to working alongside him to take P&I to new levels in the years to come.”