Name: Cris Matthews

Business name: Matthews Brothers Pyro

Opening hours: Contactable by phone, Facebook page and www.matthewsbrospyro.com

Address: No business premises, based in Ellesmere

When did you open your business and why?

We OPENED back in 2012 and the reason was because me and my brother both love fireworks, so we started a family business.

He was my best man at my wedding, and as a thank you to him I booked him a ‘how to do professional fireworks’ course, and from there, the idea grew to follow that passion.

That has led to where we are at the moment. It pretty much started from an idea around a pub table after a great day, and we decided we would give it a go.

We used to go to Shrewsbury Flower Show and we know the people who used to organise that really well now.

Why in this location?

We’re based in Ellesmere but we deliver nationally. Our fireworks are stored here in Shropshire.

I like being based in Ellesmere. It’s a lovely place.

I used to run the business from Leeds while my brother was based in Shropshire.

I’m from Shrewsbury originally and moved away for work for some time. My wife got a job as an NHS worker in the area, and we wanted to live somewhere in the county.

We stopped in Ellesmere for a short while and decided we liked it, so we picked here.

Tell us about your business

We ONLY offer professional firework displays – we don’t retail to the public.

We deliver an end-to-end service to events including weddings, corporate parties, things like that.

We also deliver bonfire night displays.

What we do is custom design the show from start to finish, usually to music, and then I put the show together digitally before turning it into a real-life display.

All of the displays are synchronized.

It doesn’t take training to learn as such – it’s something you pick up on the job.

This field of work has quite a small community, so we network with other similar companies and learn things as we go on.

It’s a job I do enjoy doing, especially in the summer. It’s a pretty unique way of making a living, but it’s definitely something you do because you love rather than just for the money – it’s something you have to love doing.

People see the end result in the sky for five minutes, but sometimes don’t realise that a week of work has gone into that five minutes. We then have hours of clearing away and waste disposal.

What is your proudest moment?

I THINK standing on top of Wembley Stadium with some of the leading pyrotechnicians in the world.

For me personally, to know the best people in the industry and to be involved with them is amazing.

Any strange requests?

There aren’t many that I would describe as strange that stand out too much.