Cliff McLaren grew up in Masterton, where he went to school and where he got his first job coachbuilding. "Coachbuilding was my first job when I left school. Back in those days apprenticeships were the best way to go. I thought about coachbuilding and panel beating, and I talked to a couple of people and ended up coachbuilding. I chose coachbuilding because you work on new vehicles, while with the panel beating itís all secondhand stuff and I prefer to work on new rather than secondhand."

"At my first job we were cutting truck cabs in half and making double cabs. Itís quite interesting when you cut a body in half. I enjoy that kind of work. Itís changed a bit nowadays, because a lot of the stuff that comes in is already made up."

In 1985, Cliff left Masterton and moved to Greytown where he worked for a couple of years as a panel beater. "I had a panel beating and painting business a few years ago. That was in Greytown, after the place in Masterton closed down. I did that for about three years between 1986 and 1989. In the end I sold the business to another guy and moved to Wellington."

In Wellington, Cliff returned to coachbuilding. "At the job Iím in now we make curtain sides for trucks, van bodies, furniture removal bodies and a few specialised vehicle bodies for the council."

"You feel like youíve achieved something when you build something new and when you see the finished article, knowing that you have done the whole lot yourself."

Originally, I did a general engineering apprenticeship, but I always had an interest in trucks, so I decided to go into the manufacture of truck bodies. After I was trained, I spent a year working in Australia. When I came back to New Zealand, I worked for another company for a year or two and then I started my own business in 1977. I started on a very small scale, mainly working on my own and progressed from there. Now I employ between four and six people.

I like the work because you start at the beginning of a job and you progress through it until it's finished. You get to complete the truck body. You wouldn't usually build a whole truck body on your own; normally there'd be two or three people working on one job. We'd probably only have two or three new jobs going at any one time and maybe various other smaller jobs, repair work and so forth. On average it takes about five weeks for one person to build a truck body.

The work that comes to us is drivable, but it is only the cab and chassis. Most trucks are imported in that state, they aren't assembled here any more. Once the project is designed we build the framework and then we fit roofing, flooring and side panelling or curtains. Finally we do any finishing work, like fitting mudguards or lights. It is really satisfying to build a good quality product that gives reliable service to the end user.

I can't see myself moving on, I've built up a good business here, and there is definitely a demand for our product; however, there isn't a lot of room for expansion. For someone who wanted to get into the job I think they need to present themselves to firms in the industry and then they have a reasonably good chance of finding an apprenticeship. I have one apprentice at the moment and in a small firm like this I couldn't really have any more.