A BANKING boss will be swapping big wads for muddy sods on Friday when he spends the day a Higham farm.

Phil Derbyshire, relationship director for commercial banking at NatWest, has volunteered his services for the day at Roaming Roosters, in Barrowford Road.

The bank director has volunteered his help to owners Simon and Nick Mellin after they benefited from a £380,000 loan from the NatWest bank under its Funding for Lending scheme.

The funding enabled Simon and Nick to launch their bistro and farm shop which opened in September.

The business is in line to achieve a £1.2m turnover by the end of the 2012/13 financial year, smashing its predicted turnover of £433,000.

The pair this month won the E3 Business Award for Sustainability and also found out that the business had been shortlisted for the regional Red Rose Awards in the Online, Family and Environmental categories.

Phil said: “Our ‘Working With You’ scheme sees all of the bank’s business managers and directors spending at least two days a year working with local businesses to understand the challenges they face.”