The village shop in Bere Regis is amazing. It’s a Nisa, aligned with the Co-op (though I’m not sure quite how that works, because I can’t use my Co-op card there), but it has very personal service, with staff who are all friendly and chatty (even the teenagers). It is small on the outside:
On the inside, it’s a rabbit warren of all sorts of things. Store cupboard staples, bread, veg, household essentials, a chiller of meat and dairy and a freezer of ice cream (I’m sure there are other things in that freezer, but I never get beyond the ice cream). Keep going back and there is a whole little stationery section, plus papers, magazines and a big rack of crisps. You’ll also find wine, and beer, and spirits (things you aren’t allowed to buy in a New Zealand supermarket, no matter how big it is). The opening hours are fantastic, it’s got a post office, and I have benefited greatly from the seeds they give away when the front covers of the unsold gardening magazines are returned.
And it is a five minute walk away. I don’t have to turn on Zippy when I realise I don’t have yeast for the bread I’m making, or milk for an unexpected visitor.
Sidenote (with too many parentheses. Proof that I don’t get AI to write my newsletters): I wish I’d learned to drink tea and coffee without milk as a student. I could have avoided a lot of milk going sour on my windowsill (Smelling milk that might have gone off was the second in my series of Personal Demons (things that gave me the heebie-jeebies)), or disappearing in the shared house fridge.
The shop in my parents’ village in the Piddle Valley is on another level. When I was a kid, it was a boring little post office with confectionery, crisps and a few basic staples. It has since moved to an even smaller building, the old granary, but it seems to do more with the limited space it has.
It’s bursting with far more things I actually would buy than the bigger Bere Regis shop: Purbeck ice cream, Dorset flapjacks, Morgan’s Dorset honey, Jurassic Juice (of course), a huge selection of cheeses, and locally baked bread and pastries. And then there are the blueberries…
The fresh fruit and veg is fantastic, because it comes from the market in Wareham. Much of it is the same stuff you’d find in a supermarket, but it’s fresher. There are also things grown very, very locally. Watercress comes from Waddock Cross (I should note that the Bere Regis shop sells Bere Regis watercress), and the blueberries are hand-picked by Gerald (name changed as I’ve never met him to ask permission). and come from a secret location, described only as the rolling hills of Dorset.
Gerald takes pride in picking only the ripe blueberries, so you won’t find the nasty hard reddish ones that take you by surprise in a supermarket punnet. And the blueberries are probably bursting with polyphenols and other things that are good for you, because the plants have been growing since the 1940s (which means they’ve had decades to build a much richer relationship with the fungal networks in the soil that feed them).
There are also unique cards by local artists, a fully functioning post office, and some really good chat (although if they haven’t seen you in there before you’ll probably be interrogated as to where you come from).
Village shops are usually staffed by locals and supported by locals, and they’re an important part of the community.
Unlike the supermarkets, my heart doesn’t sink when I walk in; I’m not assaulted by aisle after aisle of ultra-processed food with low nutrition but high profit margins.
Unlike the supermarkets, local shops aren’t out to make money for distant shareholders, but try to survive and serve their community.
Unlike the supermarkets, they’re not replacing their counter staff with robots.
Thanks for reading Alex Hallatt's Illustrated Epistle—you can help me by sharing it, cheers!
For many people, going to the shop might be the only contact they have with anyone all day—that’s often the case for me in winter, when the rain is keeping the walkers away and the grumpy gardener isn’t out tending his plot.
Yes, village shops might cost a few pence more here and there, but that’s a price worth paying to resist the robots.
Thank you for being one of the good humans.
Alex
P.S. Molly isn't as bothered by her lameness as I am, and is itching to get back to her swimming. We're off to Portland today, and I'm sure she'll go absolutely bananas when I carry her down to the sea.
She’s not quite so keen on the backpack.
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