Last month was dominated by the Beast from the East as the snow threw Woodlands Local into chaos – but the terrible weather brought out the best in our team and the store was one of the few businesses in the area to remain trading throughout.
by Antony Begley
The only predictable thing about running a store is that it’s going to be unpredictable. With a reasonably solid and encouraging start to the year under our belt and at last a full team that has gelled well and is delivering consistently, the Beast from the East arrived and created problems the likes of which we’ve never seen before in our four years at Woodlands Local.
The final week of February was, frankly, astonishing, as it seems to have been for all local retailers across Scotland. We knew it was going to be bad – but the reality that we must accept is that we didn’t know it was going to be that bad. And it’s little consolation to realise that we weren’t the only ones who hadn’t under-prepared for the heaviest snowfall I can remember in my lifetime.
The experiences of last month should serve as a real lesson for our industry because the main thing that we all learned is that, as an industry, we don’t have anything like the support mechanisms in place to cope with extreme weather. And I don’t just mean local retailing; I mean grocery too. I’m sure everyone made a trip to their local supermarket at some point during the week of snow, for one reason or another, and it was very clear indeed that the mults were no better prepared than the rest of us.
I walked down to the local Tesco on the Friday just to see how they were coping and it was crystal clear that the answer was: “not at all”. Even the atmosphere in the supermarket was strange with an eerie, end-of-the-world feel. No bread, no milk, no fresh produce. And customers behaving like they were set to be holed up for the next six months, panic buying and rushing around like there was no tomorrow.
In fact, having spoken to a lot of retailers since and having followed Facebook and Twitter closely during the week, it was evident that local retailers had done a far better job of doing whatever it took to keep the store trading and keep stock on the shelves. Dan Brown even visited his local supermarket (pictured above) to drive a bit of footfall for his at Pinkie Farm store in Musselburgh!
Monumental efforts
Thankfully, that was also my experience at Woodlands and I have to say that I can’t thank the team enough for their monumental efforts in keeping the store open against all the odds. We had staff walk to the store on foot in knee-deep snow then shovel snowdrifts away from the front of the shop just to be able to get the shutters open at 5.30am. We had staff more or less disobey my instructions to head home early each night as darkness fell because they didn’t want our customers to be left stranded as we were the only shop in the area still open.
One of our team members, Lynn, summed it up brilliantly: “The shop is right across from the hospital and if the staff can make it to their work to treat people who are ill, then the least we can do is make it to the shop to make sure they can get a hot roll and a coffee and a bowl of soup to warm them up.” It’s the sort of attitude that makes you genuinely proud to be a local retailer and, as I say, I can’t praise the team highly enough.
Unfortunately, we did suffer just like everyone else from a lack of deliveries from most of our suppliers but it was largely understandable, given that there was two or three feet of snow on the roads in the area and the Council just couldn’t keep up with the onslaught of snowfall. But again the staff demonstrated creativity and resilience, particularly when it came to the vital hot food element of the store that was so important to so many of our customers.
As the Beast from the East took hold, with no foodservice deliveries for over a week and supplies running out, the team mucked in by making soup using retail veg; they took everything they could from the retail chillers that could be heated up in the oven for hungry, cold customers; and they basically did whatever it took to get the job done.
Astonishingly, the sales figures for the week were only around 5% down on a typical week. An analysis of the sales for the week is also very revealing. While footfall was understandably down significantly – by around 18% – basket spend was actually up around 32%. Having made the effort to get to the shop, our customers were clearly intent on making the visit worthwhile.
Stuck in Carstairs
And if you’re wondering where I was all week when the team were making such a sterling job of holding the fort, I was basically stranded. Having attended a Coca-Cola event in London on the Tuesday I had to get the sleeper train back up and should have been back in Glasgow by 7am. Unfortunately, the train sat near Carstairs in the snow for nearly five hours and I finally got into Glasgow around midday, only to find Glasgow almost literally deserted and the office closed as no one could make it in.
With no trains or buses available I called a cab which wouldn’t get to me for three hours. As I live around nine miles from Glasgow, I had no option but to wait. Four hours later with the no cab having turned up, I called the cab company and was told that they wouldn’t be able to get into town to collect me after all because the snow was getting worse. A night in the Premier Inn beckoned and the next morning, with the snow even higher, I had no option but to walk home nine miles – in a suit and dress shoes in knee-deep snow. Several hours later I arrived home blue with the cold and very much in need of a stiff dram.
But the show must go on and indeed it did. By the weekend, the store was running extremely low on stock in several key categories but even the local Booker was having delivery issues and had next to nothing on offer to alleviate the situation. Again, an analysis of the sales figures for the weekend makes for interesting reading, with record sales of products that are normally very slow as customers simply snapped up whatever they could find.
Needless to say, the feedback from our customers was fantastic with so many of them thanking the staff for keeping the store open and for helping them get through a horrendous week. Interestingly, the sales for the following week showed a significant increase and we’re clearly hoping that our efforts in adversity have won us a few more friends and some more loyalty from existing customers.
Normal service was more or less resumed the following week with deliveries beginning to arrive once more and a huge effort ensuring that the bulk of the snow was cleared from the front of the shop and the parking spaces out front. Thanks must also go to the local Council workers who kindly agreed to clear much of the snow for us – in return from a few rolls and bacon and a few cups of coffee. Little gestures like that can be very heartening when times are tough, and you could do with a helping hand. Thanks lads!
Big thaw
But it wasn’t all plain sailing after that. Just a few days after the Beast from the East departed, four of our freezers – two retail and two foodservice – mysteriously decided to switch themselves off during the night. The problem turned out to be a simple electrical fault, but we lost a lot of stock and – worse – had very little left for the foodservice side of the business. It was back to Booker to grab enough catering stock to make ends meet until our next delivery.
Back in the day a problem like this would have been the end of the world but after the week we’d had, we just viewed it as another wee challenge to overcome, and overcome it we did. We even managed to convince ourselves that it was a good thing because the freezers were needing defrosted anyway. Every cloud, and all that…
In and among the chaos, we also managed to get some more productive stuff done with a sampling session for new Starburst Chewing Gum and a long session with Diageo to get our spirits and beers offer tidied up in-store.
