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Each Monday, our Money team speaks to someone from a different profession to discover what it's really like. This week we chat to butcher Stephen Fuller, owner of Fuller's Butchers and Farm Shop in west Kent...

People think my job is... chopping up carcasses into small pieces and selling them to the public.

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What I'd say to them is... Well, actually, it is just that. But there is also an awful lot more. Stock rotation, hygiene, the financial side - knowing how much to charge for certain things and dealing with wastage. It's different from when I first started. We do a lot of pre-prepared meals now. It's not just chopping up the meat and putting it in the window!

Our qualified butchers will normally work around 54 hours a week... and earn in the region of £45,000 a year.

The job is financially rewarding... We've had a nice life from it. But I'd say most of it is being part of the community and feeling like you've got a good purpose, and you're supporting your town.

The budget is affecting us massively... We have a workforce of 25 staff and the national insurance increase for employers is going to hit us hugely. We're estimating somewhere a £20,000-25,000 increase for our business.

The pandemic, strangely enough, was absolutely amazing business-wise... Not just us, but all over the country, everyone was saying the same. It made butchers go back into the public eye again. In lockdown initially, supermarkets didn't handle it very well and people looked for alternate sources to find food. Second, hospitality was shut, so everybody had to cook. Many people had a lot of fun cooking again. That was a huge positive for our business - it gave us a boost that we've been able to hang on to. It's allowed us to reinvest in the shop.

A lot of the staff we have worked for us as Saturday boys and girls... We have quite a lot of young people who work in our business who are still at school or university, and sometimes they will just follow on. They might think they're not quite sure what to do, but they enjoy working here and they can see there are prospects for them. We generally look at the normal sort of things like a good CV and if they've had experience working in restaurants or customer service roles, and if they have practical skills as well.

Read more from this series:
What it's really like to be a... dentist
What it's really like to be a... novelist
What it's really like to be a... bouncer

We don't have a hierarchy in our business... We don't have managers or supervisors and all those sorts of things, because I don't really like a hierarchical system personally. We try to get all the staff to manage each other. It's all about respect, and it works both ways, whether you're the Saturday boy doing the cleaning, or whether your name is above the door - you have to have mutual respect.

We probably smell at the end of the day... but we're immune to it. Showering daily seems to work. When I first started there was sawdust always on the floor and if they raked it once a week that was good! But our shops now are very clean and very pleasant places to work in.

You can never tell who is going to be squeamish... It's not women or men. You get big burley builder-types come in and they recoil.

Christmas is the busiest time of year for us... All our butchery staff work every Sunday during December, and we only have one day off in the first week of December. Basically, from 1 December to Christmas Day, you'll only have one day off.

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