Basingstoke man, 49, shares journey from homelessness to successful business owner

Dave Johnson, owner of Prime Shine Mobile Valeting Services, opened the business in 2019, and has seen a huge boost in custom recently.

“I started it up just over two years ago and lately it’s just gone from strength to strength,” he said.

“It’s really taking off, especially during the coronavirus pandemic it’s got even busier because the normal car washes can’t open where as I work completely independently and do not need to have any contact with anyone.

“It was a very big risk at the time. I did have a business years ago that didn’t work out, so taking the risk to start up another one, it was a bit scary to be honest.I started with absolutely nothing.”

However, the 49-year-old from Hatch Warren hasn’t always had it so easy. From a turbulent childhood, to mental health struggles, and a period of homelessness following a marriage break-down, less than five years ago Dave says he was in a “bad place”.

“I was sleeping in the car. It’s so scary. You have nowhere to go,” he said.

“You have so-called friends, but there was not a lot of help out there. I was still on the tenancy with my ex wife, so I was legally able to live there, but it wasn’t right.”

The father-of-four said he was concerned about what staying at home would do to the three children he had at the time - one with his ex-wife, and two from a previous relationship.

He said: ”I didn’t want them in the middle or seeing any arguments, because I saw so much growing up and there is no way I would do that to him.”

Dave with his wife Nicki, mum Maureen, and four children: Matthew, Amy, Joshua and Simon.

Dave described growing up with a “very controlling dad”, and struggling with depression for much of his life.

“I was being treated for depression, so when this happened it got really bad. The only thing that stopped me doing anything was my kids. It’s them that saved me.”

He slept in his car from May to November 2016 near Reading. He said he was told that he wasn’t entitled to accommodation because he’d made himself “intentionally homeless”, and could not stay in the area as he felt under threat from some acquaintances.

Previously, at home in Basingstoke, he had been an ice hockey coach.

“I just couldn’t do anything like that any more,” he said.

“All sorts of things are going through your head. You think you have friends and you haven’t. That's when you find out who your true friends are.”

While in Reading, Dave met his wife Nicki. He said that, despite having a room to go to at her parents’ home, Nicki stuck by him, and would sleep in his car with him.

“She stood by me all the way. Despite all that was going on, there was at least one person there.”

Dave Johnson with his wife, Nicki.

Whilst in Reading, Dave helped convert a double-decker bus into a “sleeper” for the homeless, and worked with those struggling to get out of the homelessness “cycle” through the Community Action Ark project.

“We ran it for the first couple of weeks. That brought my whole mindset around,” he said.

“I may have been homeless, but I had a car. When you go out on the streets of Reading, talking to them, it’s shocking. We did get a few people off the streets. If all that work saved one person, then it was worth it.”

However, it wasn’t long before Dave’s change in perspective got him thinking about what his priorities for the future were.

He said: “Something clicked, and I made the decision that I didn’t care if people wanted to do whatever, I was coming home for my kids.”

Dave says he was able to secure council accommodation after fighting his corner and now lives in Hatch Warren with Nicki and their two-year-old son Joshua.

“Once we moved here it got me thinking about starting my own business, and I finally did. My mum bought my first van.”

Dave said he is beyond grateful to his mum for giving him the start he needed.

“Once my dad passed away, my mum was a completely different person,” he said.

“She is the person she wants to be now, and without her I wouldn’t have the business I have now.

“My mum says how proud she is, and she knows that she gave me the step up.”

Dave credits his mum, Maureen, with getting him where he is now.

When asked if he ever would have believed where he is now just five years ago, Dave said: “No way. When you are in that situation and you’ve got nowhere, you feel like you’ve got nobody. A lot of the time, you think, what’s the point in me being here, what’s the point in me living like this.

“I thought I was at the lowest of low, but when you see the things I saw, it’s an eye-opener.”

Dave says, for him, having positive focus points like his family and his love for ice hockey has made a huge difference.

“I have suffered a lot with depression but when I started getting myself sorted, I started getting back into ice hockey again. When you’re out there doing your sport, it doesn’t matter what’s going on in your life. It’s such a release.

“I think everybody needs to do something like that. Even if it’s just an hour a week to stabilise the mind.”

Dave is now watching his son fall in love with the sport through the Junior Bison, and is coaching for planet ice. He is enjoying being so close to all his children and his mum, who all live in Basingstoke.

He says that, since he’s come back, things have “settled down” with his ex-wife, and he now has their 15-year-old son, Simon, to stay every weekend and for half of the school holidays.

“We’re a proper family now, even though it’s a split family. I couldn’t have stayed away any longer. My kids saved me.

“Before I felt like there wasn’t a future but now there is, and it’s a future to work for. I want my kids to have a good life, and the only way I can do that is by trying to set an example for them. The last thing I want to live with is what if? For such a simple word, ‘if’, it’s got such a large meaning.”

Sending a message to anyone facing similar struggles, Dave said: “You may be feeling like that, but it’s just now. Not next week or next month, or tomorrow even.

“But if you want something, you’ve got to go out there and do it. It’s not going to fall onto your lap.”

Looking to the future of Prime Shine, Dave said: “I would like to get another van on the road and get someone else in to work with me. That’s something that’s on the cards at the moment.

"I’m having to send people away, and I never ever thought I’d be in that situation."

• If you are affected by an of the issues discussed in this article and need someone to talk to, call Samaritans on their free hotline: 116 123.