Island Life Magazine Ltd April/May 2009 | Page 124

life

LOCAL BUSINESS

Photo: Malcolm Lake

Sitting pretty in turbulent times
While familiar stores are leaving gaps in the nation’s high streets, an Island
independent store continues to grow. Island Life finds
out how Buywise does it
MALCOLM LAKE pushes a button
on the plush leather arm chair and
reclines. “Maybe this is how I’ll spend my
retirement,” he jokes. You somehow can’t
imagine it. This is the man who started
an electrical repair business with nothing
but a van, and now sits atop a business
which is not only holding its own while
high street multiples are leaving gaps like
missing teeth in Britain’s high streets, but
continues to grow. Well might he put his
feet up.
The recliner is part of the furniture
department in Buywise, a relatively
new part of the business – and this
is exactly the point. Malcolm’s is a
story of adaptability and evolution, of

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Article by Roz Whistance
bending with the times and reacting when
conditions and regulations make things
difficult – to pop up again, rather like that
reclining chair.
Not that he needs lessons in how to
relax. For Malcolm’s surprising alter
ego is that of the proprietor of the toy
museum and shop in Godshill. So when
he leaves Buywise in the capable hands of
his children, he is not going to be short of
anything to do.
It would be nice to say that Malcolm
started his white goods life in a white
van – but in fact it was an ex-Post Office
van, for which he paid £250. He went

about in Enfield, north London, repairing
electrical goods, where his claim to fame
was that he serviced the washing machine
of Olivia Newton-John. He and his wife
Sylvia acquired a little shop, and the
business started to grow. “In those days
we repaired vacuum cleaners, and we used
to recalibrate steam irons for 30 bob,”
he smiles, and it sounds like another age.
“Sylvia brought the children into the
shop, sitting them in high chairs while she
looked after customers.”
His big break came with a contract to
service equipment for all the fire stations
and schools north of the Thames. So
when, on holiday in the Isle of Wight in
1975, they saw a house they liked, they

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