A Chorlton revolution ……….. the self service shop

Now we are so familiar with the supermarket and the convenience store, that it takes a moment to  appreciate just how much self service shopping was a revolution in how we bought our groceries.

I am of that generation, who was part of that revolution, and I can remember just how liberating it felt at the time to wander the isles, and touch and choose which apples, tins of vegetables and packets of biscuits to buy.

Today we can be cynical about it all, not least the way it allowed shops to cut costs, and set the customer doing some of the work, but it was I maintain quite liberating.

Here in Chorlton, there is still a book to write about the arrival of those first self service shops, including which were the first and just what people thought about them.

The Co-op  was the first to embrace the new way of shopping, turning a department of its store in Romford over to self service in 1943 and five years later fully converting its premise in Portsea to selfservice.*

And in 1949, The Manchester & Salford Equitable Co-op  began altering its existing stores the following year, with our own Hardy Lane opening in 1959.

Until this week, I didn’t know that the shop on the corner of Manchester and Ransfield roads, was offering its customers, “Self Service” in 1961 and a quick trawl of the directories should pinpoint when the Mark Down began its new venture.
Leaving that aside, it is the shop window which is equally fascinating, offering up a range of products which are still familiar, but at prices which at first glance appear astonishing.

But those prices must be set against most people’s incomes which were of course much lower than today.
The more pertinent question would be to explore and then compare the average food bill in 1961 with today and its percentage of all house hold bills.

All of which is getting too serious and so instead I shall just leave you pondering on the prices, which are expressed in shillings and pennies, which I suspect will be a mystery to any one born just before we went decimal in 1971.

Our own kids look back at me with sheer bewilderment when I explain that 12 pennies made a shilling, that 20 shillings made a pound and that 240 pennies made a pound.  Added to which there was a coins called a threepenny bit, a sixpence, and a half crown, all of which competed with the farthing and the ha’penny.

Added to which the price of posh objects often came as guineas and not pounds.

And that neatly brings me back to self service shopping which predated our decimal coinage by just a few decades.

Location; Chorlton

Pictures, Manchester Road, 1961, A H Downs, m18078 and current prices, Mark Down No. 93 Manchester Road, 1961, , A H Downs, m18080, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass, and Spotlight on Self Service, from Co-Op First Self Service UK, http://hardylane.blogspot.com/

*Co-Op First Self Service UK, http://hardylane.blogspot.com/

Esselunga ………….

When in Italy, shop at Esselunga, both because the shops are full of good quality stuff, and because I like their yellow shopping bags which are bright sturdy, and look the business.

So much so that Rosa always buys a few of the bags for us to take home.  A practice which I add to whenever we shop there.

All of which is an introduction to a new occasional series on the supermarket, looking at the first stores, the introduction of self service, and a lighthearted reflection on supermarkets I have used across the EU.

And that brings me back to Esselunga, which was established in 1957, presently has 180 stores, and is Italy’s 23rd largest company.

At first glance the store we use looks little different from any British equivalent, but look closely as you linger over the fruit, vegetables and cheese shelves, and what strikes you is the range, variety and sheer colour of what is on offer.

The vegetables and the fruit are bigger, do not conform to that standard shape and size you often find in a British store, and yes many are wonky, with the earth still clinging to them.

They are what they should be, food taken directly from the ground and not as so often appears here a product that could have been made in a factory.

In the same way the cheese looks like cheese, and the bread rivals that made in the local bakery around the corner.

Now, I am not against the quirky independent sector, which sells everything from craft bread, to organic vegetables and clearly sourced meat and sits at the heart of most communities.

I like them too and support them as much I can, preferring the locally baked bread to the factory stuff, and will always order books from our bookshop instead of going online.

But I also remember the small corner grocery shops of my youth in the 1950s, where the cheese on offer was either “red” or “white” and what passed for fresh vegetables had seen too many Mondays.

So, that is it, other than to invite pictures, stories or memories of a loved supermarket.

Location; Italy

Pictures; Esselunga shopping bag, courtesy of Esselunga, and the produce from our near by shop, 2019 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Esselunga, https://www.esselunga.it/cms/homepage.html/