Entrusting a stranger with the personal care of a loved one is not easy. You need to have trust and confidence that the company you engage to care for you or your loved one will do their absolute best for the individual. That’s what Mary Lee believed when she started Helping Hands in 1989; and even though we now have more than 900 directly employed staff, our philosophy hasn’t changed and we remain a family run business.
A Family Business
Back in the 1980s, our founder Mary Lee identified a gap in community care services that local authorities could not fill. With a background in teaching children with learning difficulties and having worked in several Social Services departments around the country, Mary noticed that there was a need for care provision in peoples’ own homes.
Midshire’s Care Limited was formed in May 1989, trading as Helping Hands Homecare by Mary Lee. The idea for the name Helping Hands came from a gadget that was distributed to the elderly to help them pick up items they needed or had dropped. Before long Mary’s boys were helping with the business. Ben, now the Company Secretary, helped with wages when he came home from school and Tim, now the Managing Director, helped with calls and clients’ cleaning when home from University during the holidays.
Business blooms
In 1992, The Community Care Act enabled local authorities to ‘buy’ in help from private businesses. Mary started off making spot purchases, which were followed by block contracts with Warwickshire and Worcestershire. Mary continued to make spot purchases in other counties.
In 1995 we opened our first office over a hairdresser’s salon in Alcester High Street in Warwickshire and Tim Lee joined the business full-time after completing his degree and 6 years spent working in a commercial capacity elsewhere. In 2000 we moved into bigger premises at 8 Church Street, moving in to number 9 and then 10 Church Street as the business grew.
As we grew, the need for a dedicated training division was obvious; Training Matters was set-up as a sister company to Helping Hands Homecare to allow us to control our own training, ensuring that our Carers and staff received the very best guidance and preparation.
In 2007, after 18 years, Mary left the business in the very capable hands of Tim Lee, Ben Lee and the Senior Management Team.