Joyce's Column: June

As promised in my May Chat column here are some tit-bits from the ARE show in Manchester in April.

I was speaking with David Ash of FatSpanner and he was happy with the show he said they had several new leads, and Gary Newman of Newmans Sales said he had sold machines to a new customer, so he was very pleased with the show, and he said it was great to see the Irish visitors at the show.

E- Service’s Paul Scott went into Manchester City Centre following the after-show party. He was on Deansgate with a party of people when he slipped and fell off the kerb, so the second day of the show he was hobbling about a bit, but like the real trouper he is, he stuck it out to the end of the show. Paul you really must take more care and maybe take more water with your alcohol!!

NSM’s Lisa Lambert really celebrated her recent 50th birthday numerous times and some of them being at the Manchester show, I think many bottles of wine were consumed and enjoyed and here is a photo of Lisa and I enjoying a GLASS not a BOTTLE of wine, and I will confess we did enjoy the GLASS.

Many thanks to Carnaby Gaming’s Derek Lynch for acting as my chauffeur to get me home after the show, it did save me some messing about on the tram, and I was home much quicker.

BANDAI NAMCO’s boys look very relaxed at the show as the photo shows, they were certainly enjoying their food, and I am told they went into the Gay Village in Manchester following the after-show party and that Steve Short gave great karaoke entertainment. Mind you I have to say despite their night out they all looked remarkably well on the second day of the show.

Andy Bower of the ITL-Group was a brave man at the after-show party when he decided to dance with me, and despite the drink that he spilled over me, I did enjoy the dance Andy.

HC Terminals Bob Hepworth was another brave man, we were both staying at the same hotel and walked back together, but my feet were killing me, I had worn heels all day, and just needed to take my shoes off, so I did on the walk back to the hotel, and Bob being the gentleman that he is carried them for me. Mind you, we came to a path that was rather gravelly so I had to put them back on again and suffer the pain.

It was lovely to see Joe Pritchard of Maggi Electronics at the show, and I have to say he looked very well. I have known Joe since he joined Coin Controls X number of years ago, and he never seems to age. Glad you decided to visit the show Joe, and after all it was only on your doorstep, so it would have been a shame not to have attended.

Now we have a photo of Billy Codd (Karen’s husband) with a huge Candy Floss, this was from Instance Automatics Tina Eason for Karen but she was not in the office, so Billy took delivery of it. I think he did try it mind you, but left 99% of it for Karen, who did enjoy it very much.

Now steering away from the show, and I am going to talk about Sound Leisure who have recently had two major projects, number one was for two custom classic jukeboxes for a well-known international brand, one was shipped to Paris and the other to New York, which went live this month.

Number 2 was the launch of their new 10 BGM shown at the recent Manchester show and installed at Salts Mill, Saltaire, Bradford for the ‘We Will Sing’ exhibition, to coincide with Bradford being the UK City of Culture 2025. ‘We Will Sing’ is a work memory and imagining drawing on the origins of textile processes that once filled Salts Mill and the site response installation weaves together voice, song and printed word in a material surround made from woven wool sourced from local textile companies.

 Sound Leisure were approached six months ago asking if they could provide a solution to a problem that the renowned artist Ann Hamilton had for her latest exhibition opening in May as part of Bradford’s City of Culture project. Their mission was to create a number of LP playing record players manufactured either to automatically restart at the end of a record being played or have a defined delay between finishing a side before beginning to play again. Their 6 vinyl LP turntables were built into stillages found in the mill and played a huge part in the installation. They completed the mission of course and at the end of April attended the launch of the exhibition and witnessed people’s reaction to the exhibition and what a fantastic reaction and project they felt they had been involved with, they were also very proud to have been invited to work with the team who were fantastic throughout, and Sound Leisure wish them all the very best with their exhibition and are looking forward to a revisit very soon. Well done Sound Leisure, yet another mission completed to your highest standard, and roll on your next one.

Staying with Sound Leisure their founder and well-known industry personality Alan Black reached a new decade in June, they say ‘Life begins at 40’ well Alan is on the next 40 years after the first 40, as he was 80 on 22 June, and he is still a very active man in Sound Leisure’s business, and a man with many ideas. Best belated wishes to you on your 80th Alan and hope you celebrated in style, as I am sure you did.

Next month I will have some jottings from the Park Avenue Open Day.  

Return to the previous page

26 June 2025

See all news...