Mrs Cotter discusses the shopping provisions provided for early comers to Stevenage

Anne Cotter talks about the vans and grocers that were available for shopping early on in Stevenage, as the Old Town was the only shopping area. She also talks about the variation in prices between these two options.

Stevenage Museum

Transcript:

Ann: I used to go down on a Friday, well then eventually the coop put on a van and they used to come most mornings, maybe he’d miss Wednesday, but most mornings until about lunchtime. And you could get practically everything in there which you paid more for of course.

Interviewer: Was it considerably more than you’d expect to offset the cost of putting the van on?

Ann: Well yes, because I queried this several times, you know. I’d been to the Old Town and I’d bought packet rice and I’d bought packet rice off of the van. It was perhaps tuppence or four pence dearer than the Old Town, then I queried it and I said why, he said it’s because its prepacked, but I said well I bought prepacked rise the same thing in the Old Town. Oh yes we did pay through the nose. I mean I had a, there was a grocer in the Old Town, up in Albert’s St, and he knocked on the door one day could he supply me with anything, and I said well I’ve got my groceries. So he said well we do vegetable so I said well I’ll have some potatoes and a cabbage. And the cabbage was a half a crown now this is 32 years ago so you can see how we paid through the nose for everything and of course I took the cabbage and paid and I said well you needn’t call again.

Cotter 1986

This page was added on 30/12/2015.

No Comments

Start the ball rolling by posting a comment on this page!

Add a comment about this page

Your email address will not be published.