United Kingdom

United Kingdom

Construction
Transport
Construction
Transport

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End of an era – why retiring doesn’t mean a quiet life

Much respected and valued Regional Technical Services Manager David Gatfield reminisces on nearly 52 years at Altro before retiring at the end of June 2023.

 

"I was lucky enough to find Altro as a 19 year old in September 1971, and have been fully employed at this great company ever since. I’ve had several roles in the business from my humble beginning as an apprentice and eventually an installer with Altro’s contract division in Manchester, through to estimator and contracts manager before joining the technical department in the early 1980s.

I also had a period of working for Altrosport, which was the sports division of Altro during the early to late 1980s. With Altrosport I was involved with the planning and installation of international running tracks, artificial football fields and hockey pitches.

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I’ve travelled extensively to over 40 countries during my long career, to help with flooring issues on site in places such as Japan, North and South America, Korea, China, South Africa, New Zealand and many more, some several times over. I’ve been lucky enough to have worked on every continent apart from Antarctica and almost got to go there too once.

I’ve loved every single day of my almost 52 years at Altro and have made a great many friends across the business in all departments.

I’ve loved the travelling both up and down the UK and much further afield, but the best part of my job apart from helping to solve apparently ‘unsolvable’ problems on site, has been the hard-working inspirational Altro people I’ve been so lucky to work with for so long.

Somehow, I found my niche in 1971 and can’t think of any aspect of the whole 52 years that I haven’t enjoyed.


In retirement I’m going to do some volunteer work and have already signed up for the ‘new adventure’ - there are so many less fortunate than I have been, and I would like to give something back for my good fortune.

I also have several hobbies that I will now be able to spend more time doing, I love kayaking and cycling in the summer months, but I’m also 3 years into learning guitar too, and love reading for when the nights start drawing in and growing colder. I’m also in a local rock choir where I’m lucky to sing with a large mixed group of lovely people, where we perform at lots of gigs all year round for charitable causes.

So, I’ve had the most fabulous journey with the best company and will never forget the friends I’ve made at Altro, I couldn’t have done it without them...thank you all."