It’s been a mad few weeks. Our daily lives have changed, we miss seeing the friendly faces behind our favourite independents. We are sure you do too, so we thought we’d check in.
Not only have they had to adapt their own lifestyle to the new normal, their business has had to change too.
Today we caught up with Kelvin who manages the farm shop, cafe, offsite events & weddings at the Whirlow Hall Farm Trust to see how he and the Trust have been coping in lockdown.
What was your initial reaction to lockdown?
Concern – for the health and well being of staff and customers and the financial impact on the Trust.
How has the business changed over the past few weeks?
We’ve had to close our café, all of our markets and events have been cancelled for the foreseeable future and many weddings have been postponed. This accounts for a large part of our income.
Our Farm Shop and Butchery remain open and are incredibly busy serving walk in customers and deliveries which we have added in the past few weeks. We’ve massively increased the quantities of fruit and veg, local produce and home reared meat to meet demand.
How do you see the long-tern impact on small businesses?
The concern is how long this goes on for – the longer the café remains closed and markets are cancelled the more difficult it will be for these to recover. We are hopeful that we can get some weddings on later in the year, but many have been rearranged.
We really hope that many of our new found customers, both local and further afield stick with us in the future and see the value and quality of a Farm Shop and Butchery serving fantastic home reared beef, pork and lamb, local chicken and veg and loads of other fantastic local produce. If demand remains, we will most likely continue deliveries in some form so that those that can’t get up to us (we’re a bit out of the way) can still use us.
What has been your daily coping strategy in these crazy times?
One job at a time – it will all get done eventually! That and a good dose of gallows humour.
Find out more about the Whirlow Hall Farm Trust here.
Check out our Coronavirus Directory, it’s updated daily.
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