Case Study - Clare Phelan

Former health service worker Clare Phelan was forced to make colleagues redundant before deciding to leave herself…and she has never looked back.

After a career spanning 22 years in the health industry, Clare finally decided it was time for a change.

The ex-nurse and hospital customer service manager now runs a successful lawn maintenance franchise with GreenThumb, running a busy team of four staff.

But it may never have happened if she had not been asked to announce a wave of redundancies in her old job.

It was March 2003, and after being given the difficult task, she decided to quit herself.

“It was a wake-up call - I realised I had to do something I had control over,” she remembers.

At the time, Clare, now 43, was a customer of GreenThumb, Britain’s largest lawn-treatment franchise. She had always been impressed with the way the company worked, their results and how well they looked after their customers.

After a thorough investigation and interviews, Clare decided to sign up with GreenThumb in Milton Keynes.

Starting with a leaflet campaign and through referrals, Clare was soon taking care of more than 1500 customers.

Now, three years on, she has had to move into a larger office and storage facility to meet demand.

While Clare conducts all first meetings with customers, she employs an administrative assistant and three full time lawn technicians to help her run the business.

One of these technicians is her life partner. Ray was a car spare parts salesman and now works with Clare, and is starting to help out on the management side of things.

“It suits us both,” says Clare. “It’s great having him around and having someone else to bounce ideas off.”

While she didn’t know anything about franchising before, Clare would recommend it without hesitation.

“It can be a gamble but I have been delighted with Green Thumb and their helpful and honest support.”