INDUSTRY FEATURE 50 years woven into industry
TREVOR IN THE OAKLEY TEXTILES SHOWROOM IN NORTH HOBART.
For more than five decades, Trevor Oakley has been a familiar name behind the scenes of Tasmanian hospitality, building a business founded on service, relationships and an ability to adapt. As he begins handing more responsibility to the next generation, he reflects on an industry – and a career – that has changed enormously along the way. A fter more than half a century in textiles, Trevor Oakley is finally learning to step away from the business he built.
we keep in close contact with our customers.
“I’m still in touch with my son or daughter every couple of days basically, and I still get some phone calls from people who might not know I’m stepping aside.” It is perhaps understandable when that business has occupied most of his working life. Trevor’s journey began in 1973 when, aged just 20, he joined Sheridan as its Tasmanian sales representative. Also a handy footballer, Trevor was already married and soon raising a young family, so he had plenty of motivation to make the opportunity work. “If you can imagine me as a 20-year-old, I needed the money,” he says. “I had two kids by the time I was 23 and not a lot of money. “I had a very good guy that employed me and I’ve still got the original letter. When he employed me, I was earning $6000 a year plus incentives, and I needed that. It made me work really hard.”
Well, sort of.
These days Trevor is spending more time travelling, escaping part of Tasmania’s winter on the Sunshine Coast and enjoying a little more freedom after more than 50 years in the industry. But completely switching off from Oakley Textiles is proving considerably harder. “It’s pretty hard when you’re in your own small business just to walk away,” Trevor says with a laugh. “I started it from nothing and now we do around three million a year in sales. We don’t do a lot of advertising, but we’re very well known, and
He travelled the state calling on small retailers at a
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Tasmanian Hospitality Review August/September Edition
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