Western Studios, Leeds Ltd

Listen to the audio trailer HERE

Leeds is the largest city in the largest county on the UK mainland. It is a former imperial textile centre. Now, it is a major UK financial centre. The Working Hours Podcast documents the city’s experiences through COVID and Brexit. It covers creeping technological unemployment. It also explores new and ongoing resource wars, the ongoing removal of the welfare state, and the accelerating ecological emergency.

All episodes are available on YouTube here

Support The Working Hours project with a financial donation.

Please Help me record to 1000 interviews over this decade.

The show is in desperate need of financial support.

If you can, please click a link below to help. You can give a one off donation. You can also buy monthly memberships to help me with all the costs of making the show. This support will also help me get paid for my work.

Ko-Fi – one pound memberships and one off donations.

Patreon – one hundred pound memberships

Liberapay – regular weekly monthly or annual payments of whatever amount.

Listen to Working Hours:

Work Spins Us Right Round Baby – Working Hours

Recorded on 19/05/2026Chris Black left school in 1986 intending to become a painter-decorator but ended up joining his dad’s growing company instead. Starting as a factory lad and then working his way up through the departments of installation, service, sales, and then spending 25 years as managing director before becoming the joint chairman of the business. Sound Leisure today is a global specialist selling their Jukeboxes in more than 40 countries around the world.Chris explains how the jukebox business has shifted during his time from 1950s Americana to becoming a global lifestyle product. We discuss how the industry moved from more accessible wide spread models to specialist high-end custom builds and the industry’s move to a much stronger emphasis on advising buyers about their products and providing long-term excellent service to their customers.Chris emphasis the vital importance of providing world class customer service and the benefit of having a family culture in business. We reflect on sustainability and discuss the pragmatic business constraints of making and shipping products. Chris tell us how Brexit is a major ongoing disruption for EU trade and we talk about the operational upheaval of COVID, when the businesses pivoted to coffin-making to help out in a time of national crisis.We also talk about Chris and Sound Leisure’s involvement in the Leeds Manufacturing Festival as well as his and his business’ support of apprenticeships, and we speak to the importance of social media for giving a modern business worldwide credibility.You can find out more about Sound Leisure at:https://soundleisure.com/https://www.facebook.com/ClassicJukeboxeshttps://www.instagram.com/soundleisurejukeboxes/www.linkedin.com/company/sound-leisure-ltd/And Leeds Manufacturing Festival at:https://leedsmanufacturingfestival.co.uk/Also metionedhttps://www.familybusinessunited.com/https://www.utcleeds.co.uk/https://leedscitycollege.ac.uk/Also check outhttps://www.leedsforlearning.co.uk/If you’d like to find out more about buying your very own Working Hours episode, then you can go to:https://western-studios.com/be-on-a-podcast/working-hours-podcast-the-paid-plan/If you want to get in touch with me about this episode or any other free episode of Working Hours or anything Working Hours related, then you can email me about this show at workinghourspod@western-studios.com.You can send a tip to me for all the work I have done and any value you have got from the show by going and donating at Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/workinghoursIt’s a £3 minimum and anything you do donate is very much appreciated.Or you can give a regular donation towards paying for the creation of new future episodes of this show by joining the Patreon at: https://www.patreon.com/c/WorkingHoursPodMemberships start at £6 a month so you will pay for a new episode every 50 months – or less – if more people join – or if people pay a higher subscription rate.Thanks for listening to Working Hours

please help the show keep going if you can.

If you’d like to support this free oral history podcast you can donate to it here: https://ko-fi.com/workinghours

Or you can buy franchises, ad space or sponsorships for the show via our Patreon shop here: https://www.patreon.com/c/workinghourspod/shop

New episodes after episode 200 will need to be paid for in order to be produced. Check out the Working Hours Podcast Paid Plan.

Why is Working Hours? Creator and host Simon Treen says:

Working Hours exists for many reasons. Primarily, to create a depository of first-hand knowledge and experience about labour and employment in my home city. This effort will span this pivotal decade in the human story. At this crucial moment for our species, what are we doing here in Leeds? Why are we doing it and what does it mean for our shared biosphere?

I want to demonstrate the breadth and depth of working roles that are available to all of us. Our media has a narrow obsession with only ever showing us cops, spies, factories, shops, and media workers. Whatever people do, someone is getting paid to do that thing. I hope to demonstrate that reality.  

My goal is to record at least an hour of experience and opinion on my guests’ work. I aim to create a total of one thousand interviews with Loiners over this whole decade. My interviews are designed to encourage my guests to think. They reflect on their own work, hopefully in new ways.

It’s not scary, but it is fun. Some of my guests have even described their Working Hours interview experience as “work therapy”.

I’d love to chat about your work and I always need guests. You don’t even have to be employed or paid to be my guest! If you live or work in Leeds, get in touch. You can be the star of the show if you are over 18. You just need to live, work, or have been born in an LS postcode.

Book your interview now!

If you would like to take part but you wish to remain anonymous then, please email me securely at westernstudios@protonmail.com

GIFT EPISODES OF WORKING HOURS ARE AVAILABLE HERE

Click here to buy ad space, ad reads, sponsorships or Working Hours franchises.

Your data is handled in accordance with our privacy policy.

For any data protection issues please email dpo@western-studios.com