The Swarfega Tough-O-Meter has handed out a place in the top five to plumbers in the Toughest Trade 2018 contest, following a hard-fought battle of the trades on social media over the past month.
Vying for the top spot in Swarfega’s coveted Toughest Trade Award, tradespeople across Britain sent in pictures of their toughest task. Using its Tough-o-meter, Swarfega judged all the entries with the hardest tasks rated as ‘Tough as Vinnie Jones’ and the softest entries gaining a rating of ‘Tough as a Cup of Tea’.
Plumbers were pipped at the post by the following top four Tough entries:
- Reaching for the sky hooks at number four…. are Linesmen who maintain the electricity distribution network. As one explained in his entry of why their trade is the Toughest: “Out at all hours of the day, in ALL weather conditions bar-NONE. Working with live cables, heavy plant, corrosive chemicals, climbing poles and towers.”
- Landing third place in the 2018 Toughest Trade Awards are mechanics who showed why this trade is a tough one to crack.
- A smashing second from Scaffolders, with offshore scaffolder, Graeme Lang stating “working in the middle of the sea in all storms and weathers scaffolding over the sea is tough! I’ve been hanging by my nuts over the sea for 15 years” (his words not ours!) – there can be no doubt that offshore scaffolding is a tough trade!
- In first place, just beating close rivals, are plasterers with Russell Ennis scooping the £200 Amazon voucher and grudging respect from other trades for their physical work shifting boards and bags, mixing and spreading plaster, and still getting a smooth finish at the end.
Mechanics made up the highest number of entrants into the competition, with nearly 20% coming from this sector. Most trades got stuck in though, with some great banter between plumbers and plasterers who were keen to make sure that their trade was represented against the farmers, roofers and welders who also entered.
As a thank you for getting involved, Swarfega is sending out a Tough by Swarfega shower gel to the first 50 applicants in this year’s contest.
Tell Swarfega what you think – if you disagree with this decision, let the team know why on Facebook @swarfegaoriginal or Twitter @SwarfegaUK.
