Meet Luciano Bellenie: Southern Operations Manager

Today we’re talking to Luciano Bellenie, our Southern Operations Manager about being a true naturalist, his former life as a field biologist, and what he thinks the future holds for Contego. 

Q: Tell us about your role as Southern Operations Manager and what you do day to day.

A: My day to day role involves running a service team of pest technicians across the South of England. Our area covers Peterborough, South Birmingham, South Wales, the South West, Essex, Kent, Surrey, and Hampshire. Day to day, I could be doing anything. The way I look at it, it’s no good me telling the service team what to do if I’m not out there doing it myself. 

Contego is service focused and customer focused, so my main jobs are keeping standards high, making sure customers are happy, making sure jobs adhere to the contract SLA, and making sure we’re on track with callouts, jobs are getting done, and everything is running smoothly. 

Q: How has your career progressed and what led you to working for Contego?

A: I’ve only ever worked in the pest industry. I worked for myself for three years, then after that I worked for Cannon Pest Control for a year as a technician. After a year, I became a senior technician for the team. Then in the following year, I became a field biologist and I worked in that role for three years. 

After that, I was approached by Ecolab to work in a business develop manager role which mainly involved pest control sales. I did that for four years then I got cold feet. I realised that I missed the service and technical side of things, so I left and was offered the Southern Operations Manager role at Contego. 

Q: You were a field biologist in a previous role. What does a field biologist do?

A: A field biologist does technical audits for pest control sites. That could be food and beverage sites or any sites that are struggling with ongoing pest activity. The role is quite varied and can involve anything from identifying invertebrate pests, carrying out quality audits, or developing strategies to combat pest species on a site. 

Q: What took you down the field biologist/pest control route?

A: I’ve always been mad keen on natural history. From a young age, I was a naturalist and I loved studying minibeasts and various animals. I’m from an agriculture and hunting background so my family has always been into pest control and animal rearing.

I did a national diploma in Agriculture at College. While I was doing that, I realised that my interest lay not so much in the livestock on the farm, but in the pest control side of things. It was the rats, mice, and the creepy crawlies that really interested me. 

Q: How would you describe Contego to someone that hasn’t heard about you?

A: Contego is a modern pest company that delivers real pest control in the modern pest industry. What I mean by that is most modern national pest control companies have lost the ability to deliver pest control. They are good at ticking boxes and going on callouts, but they aren’t good at curing pest issues. We are all about pest risk analysis, first time fix, and root cause analysis. To me, that is real pest control. 

Q: What do you think the future holds for Contego?

A: If we continue on the upward trajectory we are on and we continue to deliver real pest control in the modern pest industry, we cannot fail. We will probably be one of the only pest control companies in the modern pest industry. That’s what the future holds; our growth will continue and we will continue to deliver real pest control.

So, Luciano lives and breathes the pest control industry and Contego’s mission and vision. With people like him on board, we cannot fail.