By Natasha Fujimoto
WITH fridges full of stock, two aged care facilities and one hospital reliant on his meat deliveries, Martin Krueger of Krueger’s Fine Meats and Small Goods in Colliver Road, anxiously watched the flood waters creep-up overnight to his shopfront door via a security camera on Sunday, October 16.
With tools and equipment ready to swoop in if necessary to save what he could, Martin was relieved when the waters finally began to recede from his shop after holding steady for some time.
Unable to open to the public on the following Monday and Tuesday, Martin was forced to discard his refrigerated van to make his deliveries to Mercy Place and Harmony Village as well as to the Private Hospital due to high water levels on the roads.
Using a four-wheel drive instead, Martin, with the help of employee David, had to make quick dashes across town to deliver fresh meat.
Seemingly unfazed by the events, Martin was full of praise for his staff while acknowledging the benefits of a small business model in being able to improvise and respond flexibly to challenging circumstances, as he said,
“To be honest, when you are a small business it’s a lot easier to turn things whichever way you need to. If you have a larger operation, it is more difficult to be flexible.
“We have two very experienced butchers on staff and a team that works well together who shared good ideas to get us through,” Martin said.
When asked how the community around the area had coped with the flooding, Martin proudly stated,
“It brought a lot of people together; I’ve never seen so many neighbours standing in the street talking in groups. People said they were talking to people that they’d never spoken to before, in that regard, it was quite a nice thing.”
