Shop Local

I received my second fruit & veg box this week, delivered direct to my door, from Doc Green’s in New Mills. I’ve shopped for my fruit & veg at Tesco’s for a long time, but decided to make the change because I know I’ll be one of the first to bemoan the loss of the shop if I fail to support a local business. 

Beautiful, fresh produce - an antioxidant explosion!!

I’m particularly passionate about the shop as I come from a family of grocers; my granddad opened his first grocery shop in Urmston when my mum was only very young and she tells me stories of how she had to work weekends weighing butter and sugar, of the characters who frequented the shop and how, as the only shop in the street with a telephone, she had to relay all sorts of messages, including news of births & deaths, to local residents. Refrigerators didn’t go into mass production, for use in the home, until after World War II, hence people used to shop every day with the grocer, the greengrocer, the butcher, the fishmonger and the baker; they therefore served not only to provide provisions, but to provide a life-line, a means via which people would meet and chat to each other and although the supermarkets of today may be able to provide almost any kind of food we desire, 24/7, they cannot and will never be able to provide that same sense of community.  My mum and dad bought their own grocers when I was about two years old and I too remember the local characters who frequented the shop; there was always a chair available for them to rest or wait to be served and my favourite day was a Wednesday when the fruit & veg would be delivered and I would spent time with my mum arranging the colourful display. I would love to have carried on the tradition and opened my own greengrocers, but I suppose working in the field of nutrition is just another avenue of providing nourishment to others.