A veteran Sutton tyre technician has been named one of the nation’s best — and scooped £1,500-worth of prizes.

John Crooks won technician of the year at the second Eden Tyres & Servicing (ETS) annual competition.

Technicians from Eden’s 14 UK sales retail branches were nominated for the prestigious award, and the hopeful contestants were whittled down to a shortlist of 10.

John, 47, of Brinsley, who works at the Sutton branch of ETS, won the competition, an Argos gift card worth £500 and £1,000 to spend on new tools.

The competition was sponsored by Firestone, who are one of the main tyre providers for the company.

John is celebrating 30 years as a tyre technician and moving into a new assistant manager role.

“I come to work with the attitude that I’m going to do my work as best I can. When I’m here I’m going to give 100 per cent,” he said.

“They did a presentation to all of the finalists who had won the £500 vouchers, and so showed up at my work to present to me.

“They put the banner up and then the operations manager came out and handed me a bottle of Champagne, and John Tagg, the branch manager, was waiting there with the cheque. It was a real shock, but I’ll let them off.

“They said that the award wasn’t just for this year, but also for all the other years of hard work.

“I’m very humbled. I was more than happy to be in the top 10 – I also made the top 10 last year too.

“I’m very very grateful to Eden Tyres. I’m overjoyed really.”
A spokesman for ETS said: “We set this competition up to reward our most loyal and hard-working staff at the end of each year.

“We set up this initiative to encourage our staff to work hard and shine throughout the year. We find a bit of competition brings out the best in them.”

Pictured, from left, are Jim Nicholls, retail operations manager; John Crooks; Jon Tagg, Sutton branch manager; and Sam Allatt, of Bridgestone.