{"id":33951,"date":"2026-09-19T14:22:32","date_gmt":"2026-09-19T13:22:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/?p=33951"},"modified":"2026-09-18T14:23:32","modified_gmt":"2026-09-18T13:23:32","slug":"paul-puts-fresh-start-on-the-menu-with-ovenu-shrewsbury","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/paul-puts-fresh-start-on-the-menu-with-ovenu-shrewsbury\/","title":{"rendered":"Paul puts fresh start on the menu with Ovenu Shrewsbury"},"content":{"rendered":"<span class=\"span-reading-time rt-reading-time\" style=\"display: block;\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Reading Time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\"> 2<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minutes<\/span><\/span><h3 style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Paul Skelton has called last orders on a career in the pub and club trade to launch oven cleaning service Ovenu Shrewsbury.<\/h3>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><img data-dominant-color=\"69675e\" data-has-transparency=\"false\" style=\"--dominant-color: #69675e;\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-33953 size-large not-transparent\" title=\"Ovenu Shrewsbury04\" src=\"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-733x1024.webp\" alt=\"Ovenu Shrewsbury04\" width=\"696\" height=\"972\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-733x1024.webp 733w, https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-215x300.webp 215w, https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-768x1072.webp 768w, https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-1100x1536.webp 1100w, https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-1467x2048.webp 1467w, https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-301x420.webp 301w, https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-602x840.webp 602w, https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-150x209.webp 150w, https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-300x419.webp 300w, https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-600x838.webp 600w, https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-696x972.webp 696w, https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-1392x1944.webp 1392w, https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-1068x1491.webp 1068w, https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury04-scaled.webp 1833w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 696px) 100vw, 696px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The 48-year-old has finally fulfilled a long-held ambition to run his own business after spending the past 12 years working for pub chain Wetherspoons. He spent his final 13 months as kitchen manager at The Wilfred Owen in Oswestry, having previously worked as a shift leader at The Shrewsbury Hotel.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cI\u2019ve always worked in hospitality, so keeping kitchens and ovens spotless is nothing new to me,\u201d he joked of his new venture. \u201cI\u2019d thought about setting up my own business for some time and reached a point where I thought, \u2018If I don\u2019t do it now, I never will.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Before joining Wetherspoons, where he undertook a variety of general management roles, Paul worked for several pub and bar operators, including Bar Med and Yates, at locations around the country.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He eventually settled in Shrewsbury, where he met his partner, and has now lived in the market town for 20 years. The couple have a 19-year-old son and a daughter who is preparing to take her GCSEs.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He\u2019s now looking forward to leaving the unsociable hours of the pub trade behind and having greater control over his working week.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cOne of the big attractions of working for myself is being able to organise my own diary and no longer finishing after midnight! It\u2019ll mean I can spend more quality time with my family \u2013 and hopefully find a bit more time to get to the gym as well.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He chose the franchise route with Ovenu as it gave him the freedom to work for himself without starting completely from scratch, with training, practical support and an established brand behind him.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Paul will initially focus on building a loyal client base, adding: \u201cI know it will take a little time, but I\u2019m prepared to work hard to establish a good reputation. Eventually, I\u2019d like to grow the business to the point that I can take on another oven technician.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ovenu Shrewsbury covers the SY1 to SY3 postcodes, which includes Shrewsbury, Castlefields, Greenfields, Mount Pleasant, Monkmoor, Abbey Foregate, Sutton, Uffington, Bayston Hill, Bicton Heath and surrounding areas.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ovenu founder and managing director Rik Hellewell said: \u201cPaul has spent much of his working life in hospitality, where customer service, high standards and attention to detail really matter, which will stand him in good stead.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Ovenu process involves dismantling key oven components before cleaning them using specialist equipment and non-caustic, biodegradable products. The service also covers hobs, extractor hoods, microwaves and range cookers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Paul Skelton has called last orders on a career in the pub and club trade to launch oven cleaning service Ovenu Shrewsbury. &nbsp; The 48-year-old has finally fulfilled a long-held ambition to run his own business after spending the past 12 years working for pub chain Wetherspoons. He spent his final 13 months as kitchen [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":33954,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[78,37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33951","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ovenu","category-cleaning-franchises"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Ovenu-Shrewsbury12.webp","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33951"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33951\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33957,"href":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33951\/revisions\/33957"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.franchiselocal.co.uk\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}