Retail - Nineteen Sixties Style

I grew up in the 1060's. I was number six child in a family of seven children. My Mum stayed at home to care for the family and our Dad ran a small business supplying timber to the local builders.

We lived in a small country town and bought our needs from the retailers in that town who were often our neighbours and our friends.

It was a time when shops were somewhere you would go when you needed something. Back then our needs were simple. We needed clothing for warmth and modesty, we needed food to sustain us and we need shelter to protect us from the elements.

We shopped to fulfil a need. Or as you will hear, the shops came to us.

My mother would ask for what she needed for the week. When she asked for potatoes, she was never asked, would you like cucumbers with that, or told if you buy a cabbage and pumpkin, you can have a pineapple half price. My mother would ask for what she needed and pay in cash or in some cases put the cost of the wares bought, on an account which was paid either weekly or monthly, but with no account fee.

There was trust and respect as the businesses were all local and all relied on each other for thier livelihood.

There were no add on’s, no high pressure selling, no plans that you can't get out of, no sign up fees, no hidden fees, no hungry credit fees, it was simply buying to meet a need and having that need meet. It was friendly shopping always with time for a chat and a catch up. You were treated as a real person by people who cared. And if you said you didn't need anything today, thank you, it didn't matter and there was still time for a chat.

Retail simplicity, the way it should be.

Each week we were visited by:

The milkman came daily, we never saw him as he delivered the pint sized glass bottles, with silver foil lids, in the wee hours. We had a special wire basket with divisions to fit the bottles. I recall there being about six bottles a day and on Sundays there would be a quart bottle of cream as well. This was to have with desert after the traditional Sunday roast lamb dinner.

The baker would deliver bread daily, also in the wee hours. Usually there would be two loaves of delicious, unsliced bread, fresh from the ovens.

“Mr Bubbles”(our family name for him), the Egg Man, generally came on Saturday mornings. Mr Bubbles would knock on the door, holding a large wire basket, full of creamy brown eggs. Mum would take out a dish and fill it with eggs for the week. I seem to recall three dozen as being the usual quota. Mum did a lot of baking to feed the hoards!!!

“Vin”, the Green Grocer came on Thursday mornings, in his van on which the side lifted up to reveal his wares, lovely fresh fruit and vegetables. These complimented the vegetables that Dad grew in the garden.

Mostly Vin arrived after we had left for school, however if ever there was a good day to be sick, it was a Thursday!! Oh, to go out to the front gate with Mum, in sick day attire of pyjama’s and slippers, and to be treated to a packet of Fruit Tingles (like lifesavers, without the hole and fizzy when you popped them in your mouth) that Vin always had on hand and to have those Fruit Tingles all to one’s self while the other kids were at school, oh what a treat!! Yes, Thursday’s were definitely the day to get sick!!!

“Notts” Grocery Store. Mum would place a grocery order every Monday morning via telephone and that afternoon the order was delivered to the door, with boxes of food bought inside and placed on the kitchen table for Mum to unpack and put away.

Not too much excitement here UNLESS, there was an exciting series of models, toys or treasured and popular cards in the cornflakes packet. Then great sleuth was employed to be the proud owner of the prize, without detection.

The race was on, especially between me and my two brothers, immediately older than me. Accessing the prized article meant opening the new Cornflake's inner packet and if this occurred prior to the previous packet being finished then serious consequences could lie ahead if discovered (usually in the form of a reprimand, luckily for us that was as serious as it got), but oh, so worth it.

Once a month, or thereabouts a man would arrive in a van. Dad referred to him as “Oil”, no idea why. His wares were generally clothing items along the lines of men’s work wear and an assortment of family socks and underwear. Mum would buy items for Dad, and sometimes the boys, but generally we girls missed out except for the odd new singlet or pair of cottontails. He also carried such things as skivvies, which were items of clothing that other kids wore. We had singlets to wear under our shirts, and spencers (long sleeved singlets) to wear in winter, but skivvies were denied us, not sure why, but in being denied skivvies, we longed for them, and badgered Mum to buy as some skivvies.

Aside from these retailers that visited selling their wares, there was the clothing store where Mum had an account and where we were sent if we needed new clothes. We would be instructed to try on the school dress, pyjamas, jeans etc and to put it down on the account.

Likewise with the Pharmacist’s store, we would be sent to buy medicines and sanitary items etc and just put it down to Mum’s account, which they did, no questions asked. In fact, often the sales assistant would get in before us and ask “Is that to be put down?”

Like I said before, there was trust and respect.

Today shopping has become a past time. It is no longer based on meeting simple needs as needs has blown out to include having the latest and greatest of pretty much everything that temps us in the glossy "must have" advertising that saturates our senses wherever we turn.

Don't get me wrong, it is a wonderful time to live in a time with so much available to us. However we have become a society that lives beyond our means as we succumb to clever advertising and the need to keep up. National debt blows out of all proportion while credit is being made available to those too young to understand the consequences of misusing it, and those who already have huge debt but happily take on more to fuel their buying frenzies.

Personally, I hate shopping! I loathe the big shopping plazas where store after store are the same as the other shopping plazas on other sides of town. I hate the pressure to buy, the hard sell which turns to total disinterest when it becomes apparent that I am only looking, or that I am only seeking advice.

I hate the fact that sale assistants are required to reach sales targets and are valued more for their sales prowess, than their product knowledge and friendliness, both of which is often nonexistent.

I hate the fact that profits from the never ending overseas owned franchises goes overseas and does not benefit our own economy.

I hate the fact that our kids find themselves sucked into this hard sell environment at a young age when they take on part time casual jobs in their teens.

I long for a simple life, and to live in an environment where people work together to create sustainable communities and life is uncomplicated.

At the risk of being labelled a whinging Baby Boomer I say:

Oh, bring back the days of "Mr Bubbles" and "Vin" and "Notts Store"!!!!

© Annie Fenn 2011