Community-run businesses are leading the way in value and service

If the concept of slow manufacturing is growing, then maybe slow shops have their place on our high streets and in our villages too, writes Caroline Bullock

(Getty)

Barbour-clad friends in their sixties are chewing the cud in a community-run store and cafe in the village of Fittleworth, West Sussex. Detached amusement over Partygate, the logistics of the gardener’s rota and something about a misbehaving dog – it’s hard to catch all the details above the noise in a full venue buzzing on a Saturday afternoon.

If the scene is a snapshot of the rural, middle England community it serves, it’s also an ode to thriving hyperlocal commerce consolidated by the “buy local” legacy of the pandemic. The shelves showcase a local ecosystem, including flour milled nearby and milk from one of the county’s last dairies. The cafe, soon to double in size to meet demand, is full of people of all ages lapping up the community spirit and being served by cheerful mostly volunteer staff. It seems like a throwback to simpler times.

I’m at my usual table, as I’m very much a regular – drawn to what at times has felt like a necessary antidote to persistent Covid gloom and an often detached, digital world. I’m not missing the autopilot trawl of the high streets, parking charges and the spending-for-spending’s-sake consumerism that once defined weekends, nor am I surprised that the community store’s simple appeal has sustained even as restrictions eased and our options broadened.