Community Shops in the Snow!
The following three case studies were written by the respective shops about how their shops had coped with the snowy conditions the week before Christmas 2010, and how their shops had served their communities - and vice versa.
Saturday 18th December 2010 at the Galleries Shop & Café (Freshford and Limpley Stoke)
by Alison Orme (a volunteer)
"Setting out from home at 7.30am on the morning of Saturday 18th December, I had no idea of what lay ahead. It was snowing hard and my footsteps were the first in the snow as I walked to the shop. Our village is surrounded by hills - the only way out of the village is up and unless you own a 4x4 you are stuck!
On reaching the shop, I found that the ‘manager’ for the day (another volunteer) was unable to get through the snow and that I was in charge. Panic set in but trying to keep a clear head I prioritised what needed to be done. With the help of one other volunteer, I opened up.
No newspapers; much later we found they had been left at a Coop two miles away ... similarly, the bread delivery couldn’t make it. Our meat supplier had left our meat at a farm shop five miles up the road – fortunately a volunteer with a handy 4x4 was able to drive up to collect it.
Turning to, we started baking in our own bread oven using our pre-baked, frozen loaves and croissants. Soon the phone began to ring constantly. 'Are you open?' YES! 'Are there any newspapers?' – sorry, no; Did we have any bread?…yes, we’re baking right now. ‘Can you keep some for us?’….certainly.
As the village awoke to its snowy blanket, the shop became a very busy place indeed. Customers arrived in force. The bread oven was working at full speed and loaves were being reserved before they had finished baking. Anxious faces peered through the glass oven door ... ‘Have you got an organic brown in there?' 'Can I have that olive loaf?’
Rosy-faced village children came out to play on the ‘slopes’ behind the shop bringing their toboggans and building snowmen. It wasn’t too long before gaggles of them came into our café for mugs of hot chocolate and the shop soon developed an alpine atmosphere. 
The shop was busier than I have ever seen it since it opened eighteen months ago. Bread, milk, eggs and vegetables were flying off the shelves faster than I have witnessed before. I think the whole community came through the doors. Our small but willing band of volunteers coped admirably with a difficult morning but the upside was that the tills were ringing and we had our best ever takings since the shop opened. For quite a few people, it was the first time they had ever come – we are sure they will come again!"
But the question was: How is your shop approaching the snowy weather? Basically, by doing the same as always – we stock what people tell us they want to buy, procured as locally as possible; and we offer a welcoming environment for everyone who can get to us, and deliver to those who can't.
Spreyton Village Shop & The Snow!!
Wow, what a December we had with heavy snow falling on Spreyton, enough to even have BBC Spotlight reporting from the village centre. Spreyton is very close to Dartmoor so we had a good foot of snow and in some places it had drifted meaning that many people were unable to move their vehicles for long periods of time. The only vehicles able to get around were tractors and 4 wheel drives.
All our volunteers were fantastic, there were days when I thought people definitely wouldn’t get in and when I arrived they were already there, having walked (sometimes well over a mile, which in the snow, is a serious work out in itself!), begged lifts and even a tractor ride to make sure they were able to help out. We had a couple of super volunteers with 4 wheel drives that spent the best part of their day running around the countryside picking up milk, eggs and bread, all to make sure that our shelves were kept stocked right up so that people didn’t need to venture any further than was possible.
With Christmas fast approaching we were keen to make sure that our customers who had done pre-orders weren’t left disappointed so on Wednesday 22nd December again our volunteers with 4 wheel drives picked up all the vegetables and cheese. Our local butchers were brilliant and both made it to us to deliver everyone’s Christmas meat.
Our village is very high up so when it snows we can sometimes be quite stranded, and as we only opened in July of 2010 we had a huge amount of comments from our customers saying how grateful they were to have their village shop back (our previous shop closed 4 years ago) and they didn’t know what they would have done without it. Suffice to say that we had some fantastic days with sales hitting record figures. And it is with thanks to all those people who despite the bad weather gave up a huge amount of their time to make sure the villagers of Spreyton were able to buy their essentials, and all those yummy goodies too, right on their doorstep.
There were, of course, some elderly people in the village who simply didn’t want to risk the venture to the shop and again volunteers took their orders and delivered to their door which I know they found absolutely invaluable. I have enclosed a picture of one of our volunteers who had a tractor ride up to the shop to make her shift! I’m sure you’ll agree what a great bunch of volunteers we have and hope that you might be able to come and meet some of them in our lovely shop!!
The Burrow, Exbourne: Snow in Exbourne
At present the Burrow is being run on a temporary basis from the Village Hall here in Exbourne for two mornings and one afternoon a week. However because of the weather and the obvious need we kept the community facility open all through the week of the 20th December up to and including Christmas Eve. We have a part-time manager, Bella, who lives ten miles away on the edge of Dartmoor and by the Sunday evening she was well snowed in! Volunteers took over the running of the community facility while Bella organised the orders for local supplies from her home. Over the years we have built up a good source of local producers and this paid off in the bad weather conditions. All dairy products and eggs come from farms within a couple of miles and were delivered by tractors on a daily basis. Another farmer managed to pick up the bread and meat orders for us by dint of four-wheeled drive vehicles.
The Burrow’s café became the hub of the village with the kitchen smelling of home-made soups bubbling away on the stove and the delicious smell of bacon butties. Volunteers went round the village checking on the elderly and house-bound and keeping them supplied with the basic necessities as well as containers of home-made soup. Turnover in the shop increased by 50% as people stocked up their store cupboards. New customers came in and were surprised by the range and quality of the local produce on offer. Several new volunteers came forward to help and in one or two cases, learnt a little more about the village than they had previously known!
The Burrow came into its own yet again as it had done in February 2010 and once more proved how vital it has become to the village. It is not just a shop and temporary Post Office but acts as a meeting place where the elderly can come for some company and a centre from which volunteers can go round checking on the elderly and vulnerable members of our community; making sure fires are lit, houses are warm and all needs are met.
Being cut off by snow is not ideal but it proves that there is a wonderful and caring community spirit here in Exbourne. More people learn to appreciate the merits of a local facility, selling local produce and providing a social centre for the village.
Here’s to 2011 and all the rural community shops up and down the country.
Topplesfield Community Shop
At our community shop in Topplesfield, we try wherever possible to stock local produce. Local lines include cooked meats, sausages, bacon, milk, bread & cakes, pickles & jams etc. Our shop is staffed completely by volunteers and led by a volunteer committee. 
Just before the snow came, we had already started to publicise that turkeys, hams, chipolatas, cakes, mince pies, pickles, cheeses, fruit and vegetables from local suppliers could all be ordered through the shop and Christmas cards, small gifts and handmade Christmas decorations (made in the village) were available too. We also decided to hold a small stock of coal and logs alongside the usually-stocked kindling – space is our biggest challenge so these were held in a lockable outside container.
The snow came and our lanes are never gritted, so sliding down the hill became an everyday occurrence! As the snow stayed and more came, it became obvious that it could last through to Christmas. We received orders for free range turkeys, bacon, sausages, fruit and vegetables, and the basics of bread, milk, bacon and eggs were flying off the shelves. It seemed that we were always about to run out of something, and each time one of the volunteers would drive out of the village to pick up stock between normal deliveries. We also offered free tea/coffee and mince pies on December 23rd to cheer everyone up. Final orders for fruit and vegetables were made up on Christmas Eve when the shop was open until 1pm.
Two of the turkeys were delivered to customers at no charge by volunteers on their ways home – what service!
We decided to open for three hours (9-12) on December 27th, 28th and on January 3rd although these days were designated bank holidays. We also arranged fresh milk and bread deliveries on these days. We communicated this via the village facebook page and posters, and grateful villagers came in for fresh supplies.
In summary, we tried to reduce the number of necessary journeys out of the village; the roads were icy, and each journey to the next nearest small shop is at least 4 miles round-trip. We tried to make sure that we had plenty of coal and logs and this was very useful for those people who ran out of heating oil and/or calor gas (and there were quite a few).
We also had a lot of fun!