The Corner Shop -back in time 1950s-60s

I so agree

Totally loved the corner shops like the ones your parents ran- Loved the penny candy, the cheesy plastic charms in the gumball machines that we used to collect and keep in coffee cans- Loved the pinball machines as a teen and the jukebox- Some smelled like the cherry pipe tobacco that was stored in canisters-

I remember the old corner shops from that time when I was a kid. They were magical to me.

I'm still rather fond of my local one. They have things the supermarket has run out of and they're so handy for just a couple of items. I can pop in carrying the little dog with no problems.

My parents bought a corner shop around late 1963/64.
It sold mainly newspapers, sweets and ice cream. There were a couple of freezers that held some frozen food, i.e. veg.
We had a couple of young children and they loved Nanny and Grandad's shop.
Dad used to make paper cones for the sweeties, and they were very popular.
It was hard work, long hours and even neighbours knocking on Christmas day, for their ice cream.

The other big thing about the corner shop was the hours it opened. No supermarkets opened on Sundays or late in the evening. We used to get people arriving in cars because there was something they needed for Sunday dinner. There was actually a very peculiar list of what you were allowed to sell on a Sunday, something which was easily circumvented.

True, trisher. Our local car dealership in Sheffield worked out that they could sell carrots on Sunday, but not cars. So they sold carrots for £800 a bag, and gave a car as a free gift.

geekess Brilliant We sometimes forget how heavily regulated things used to be.

Yes, and do you remember RPM (retail price maintenance).? IN the mid-50's I worked at a hairdressing salon, which also had a sort of corner shop type thing in the front. They used to sell all sorts of things below RPM, and each week the local coppers would pop in to see the boss in the office and left a little later happy,

Franbern oh yes. Those were the days lots of rules and bent coppers!!!

Lovely programme, enjoy it very much, and so many memories.
My mother owned and ran a corner shop in the 1940’s, she did a lot of baking to sell in the shop, and the cat, Tiger, used to sleep in the window ( a living Bagpuss!)

We loved ours and my dad used to send me for a box of matches and even his cigarettes unheard of now. They used to sell sherry off the wood and you could buy a pint of it! Happy times.

Great happy times. We are turning to our local shops more now due to supermarkets running out of certain things due to stockpiling. I got toilet rolls and tissues from our local shop at weekend. I'm not stockpiling!! i needed them.

We've enjoyed this series and it brought back lots of memories. My friend's mum ran the corner shop across the road and I well remember the boxes of biscuits with glass lids, sugar in blue packets and the bacon slicer. We used to call at another one on the way to school to buy penny chews and Arrow bars. My parents had a fish shop back then and we sold bottles of pop called Hubbly Bubbly - I was never allowed it but did have the odd Dandelion and Burdock.

We moved in '63 and my parents bought a drapers shop which sold all manner of clothing, wool, stockings and haberdashery. I can remember my mum being so worried when a Spar shop opened a few doors up and started selling tights - that was the beginning of the end of the corner shops I think.

I love this series too. I remember going to the shop with my mother and waiting while they weighed out sugar, butter or cheese and cut bacon. When I was old enough to go shopping with friends for our mothers we used to ask at Liptons if they had any broken biscuits. When we were old enough to knit we used to love to go to the local wool shop and spent ages choosing a pattern. Then we would choose wool and she would put it by for us. We got quite fond of the lady who owned the shop and she of us.

I looked forward to this series, but after watching part 1, gave up, as it was so totally unrealistic with Mother making tarts with ease using an ancient oven, and then picking strawberries out in the fields and making jam. I loved the other series such as "Back in Time for Dinner", but felt there were too many unexplained happenings in this one. Glad you enjoyed it, though - must be suffering with cabin fever!

dahlia I came to the conclusion that it was just trying to document historical changes and that many of these had nothing to do with the corner shop. Which is a bit sad because there were so many corner shop things they could have included and that they got wrong. Like selling newspapersand magazines, in the 60s only certain shops were allowed to do this as it was though too many newsagents would stop them being profitable businesses. I'd also like to have seen something on the opening hours and the licensing laws. Our shop was an off-licence, my mum's name was above the door because when we took it on my dad was a civil servant and civil servants were not allowed to hold licences.