Just before Christmas, I was told about a local Farm shop which is said to have some very good supplies. I wanted to immediately rush along and see what they have in store but I was put off by the snow. Subsequent to that the past few weekends have been exceptionally busy so I haven’t had the chance to visit. However this Saturday I will be driving down to Wakefield Farm Shop with a big smile on my face. You see one of the many reasons why I moved to Milton Keynes almost eight years ago was in order to explore the countryside and buy groceries from local farm shops. As of yet, I’m yet to fully exploit the opportunities offered by the various farm shops, but it’s never to late.
Beyond the general desire, whilst I believe it’s also important to support local producers and suppliers. You see whilst I reognise, accept and even see some of the benefits of the global economy that we now live in, I believe that local is still important and if we want it to survive we need to give it support.
The only thing is whilst we have a responsibility to support local suppliers, they simultaneously have a responsibility to provide high quality products and services that meet the reasonable requirements of the public. They also need to help us to help them and not assume that we should automatically support them because they are local.
I say this specifically because I recently received a call from a local business. The caller told me about the services that he offers and highlighted the fact that he was local. I told him that I already had suppliers but was happy for him to send me details just in case. He asked me whether my current suppliers were local. I explained to him the criteria that I used to determine the suppliers that I use – beyond the basic fact that they are local. He continued talking, reminding me that he was local. He seemed to punctuate every sentence with the word local.
I ended the call by asking him to email details of his website so that I could refer to his services if I had a need. He did so. I had a quick look at the website, it had some basic text on it and nothing more. Now for a business that provide services in the creative space, I thought this was unacceptable and was left asking – did he really expect me to buy from him simply because he is local?
Ref: http://www.wakefieldfarmshop.co.uk/farmshop.html
Copyright 2011. This document is the specific intellectual property of Susan Popoola. Content may not be reused or reproduced without the specific permission of the owner or a reference to the source. Opinions may be generated
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