Some businesses begin with a marketing plan. Tony’s began on a plumbing counter in 1971.
At 15 years old, Tony Quinn joined a builders merchant and started learning about plumbing products. Around eighteen months later he moved into the bathroom showroom — and bathrooms have formed a significant part of his working life ever since.
Tony started work in 1971, on the plumbing counter of a builders merchant. Around eighteen months later he moved into the bathroom showroom, where he began to build the product knowledge and design eye that would shape the rest of his career.
By 1974 he was showroom manager, and started receiving recognition for his bathroom designs and performance. Ten years after starting out, in 1984, Tony opened his first bathroom showroom.
Today he runs Barton Design Centre in Barton on Sea — bringing more than five decades of bathroom-industry experience to every customer who walks through the door.
Tony joined a builders merchant plumbing counter, aged 15.
Moves into the bathroom showroom.
Becomes showroom manager; recognised for bathroom design and performance.
Opens his first bathroom showroom.
The Barton Design Centre in Barton on Sea.
Barton Design Centre operates is a independent showroom situated on Marine Drive in Barton on Sea. There’s no call centre, no regional management structure and no sales targets from head office — just Tony and a genuinely independent business built on repeat customers and word of mouth.
That independence is part of what allows products to be sold at trade prices in the first place — decisions get made in the showroom, not several layers removed from it.