BBC presenter Babita Sharma on what she learned from helping out in her parents’ store, and why corner shops remain an essential part of British life
I am a corner shop kid and my childhood home was shared with our customers for more than a decade. We – a family of five – ate, slept, lived and worked in the shop. We served you and you gave us business, but there was a world beyond the counter that you never knew. My parents’ store near Reading was the perfect place to learn about society as a child, absorbing shoppers’ thoughts and habits. Take Mrs Fay, who could map out the shop floor and its contents like an expert Crystal Maze contestant. Her photographic memory meant she often knew the layout better than any of us. If we rearranged anything, Mrs Fay would want to know about it so she could get her shopping list in the right order as she recited the items, aisle by aisle.
There are 50,000 corner shops in the UK, their sales worth a fifth of the grocery sector. Perhaps your local shopkeeper resembles my mum and dad; born in India, they were shopkeepers for more than 20 years. Whoever it is, they have taken on a role that remains firmly entrenched in British life.
The corner shop remains a lifeline for many immigrant communities
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