Sixteen-year-old Karen Oldfield was a machinist at Baldwin's Casuals who had a troubled teenage romance with Elsie Tanner's grandson Martin Cheveski in the second half of 1980. Despite having no machinist-experience, Karen applied to the factory when her mum told her that a position had become vacant as one of the staff had left to have a baby. She was kept waiting for several hours while Mike Baldwin supped in the Rovers. She had been unemployed since December 1979 when she left school at Christmas. Mike asked her why he should take her on when he had refused lots of other girls jobs. She replied with a demonstration of logic, saying that people outside of work had said she was a good worker but how could she demonstrate that in work when no one would employ her? He agreed to take her on