Beyond The Counter - The Grocery Store

 

Burridge's Grocery Store, Miramar, Wellington 1948

One of the reasons that grocers and greengrocers (see previous posts) were able to maintain such an orderly arrangement of their wares was to bar the customers from hands-on contact with the merchandise. There was to be no squeezing of the plums and tapping or sounding of the watermelon, not even a caressing of a jar of raspberry jam or even a can of baked beans, thank you very much! 

Hard to imagine that today's customers would tolerate for a minute being separated from their prospective purchases. Counters would be stormed, food riots would ensue if the punters couldn't read the nutrition labels, fondle the packages etc.

I vaguely recall memories as a young child of being in the premises of a store like Burridge's grocery pictured above. Smith's grocery store, I believe it was called - after Mr Smith, of course. It was a Four Square store, I think, a grocery cooperative chain but with individual stores owned by proprietors.

I recall a long counter, not so much light as in Burridge's, the smell of flour and other food items, hardwood floors, and a wooden chair or two next to the counter on the customer's side, presumably for housewives to rest their shopping bag upon or to pop a small child on for a moment or two while groceries were ordered and placed on the counter and the total tabulated. Men in white full length aprons waited upon the customers, mainly housewives. I must have been small because the memory of the counter is that it was high! 

Soon the first supermarket opened down the street and Smith's in a very short time was no more. Fickle customers. The corner dairy across the street, however, survived for decades afterwards because the supermarket didn't keep the "open all hours" schedule of a corner store. Not until a change in the shop trading hours laws occurred in the 1980s, anyway.

 Four Square Jigsaw Puzzle Cover circa 1950s

 

Some of the groceries offered for sale by Four Square grocery stores in the 1950s. Brands such as Weet Bix, Milo, and Pam's survive down to the present, but the packages are brighter, more alluring, and on-so modern... 

Green Grocers of New Zealand, 1920s - #4

A Chinese family in their green grocer's store, circa 1910s or 1920s. Unidentified.

The images in this short series of green grocer stores underscore the orderliness of the produce, everything stacked in its place, or strung like this row of pineapples above the patrons' and greengrocer's heads.

One wonders how many of the young 'uns in this photo led this business into the next generation. I'd pick all three were and that they passed it on to the next generation.A few of the descendants will, of course, have escaped the kingdom of pineapples and thickets of asparagus.

Green Grocers of New Zealand, 1920s - #3

Green Grocery store interior, circa 1920s, unidentified.

If you look closely you can see you can also buy a man's head to go with your basket of apples! A woman (?) (blurred image) sits behind the counter to the right.

The Chinese lanterns hanging from the ceiling and the green grocery staff are subtle reminders of the success with which Chinese entrepreneurs developed the retail trade in fruit & vegetables around the globe, including New Zealand. This often extended into a vertically-integrated business enterprise that began in market gardening, extended to processing, and retailing.

Green Grocers of New Zealand, 1920s - #2

Greengrocer store interior, circa 1920s. Unidentified location.

Greengrocer's store interior from the 1920s, bunches of grapes hanging by the hook. The individual grapes appear to be larger than the insipid ones on offer at my local supermarket.

Another apple poster displayed on the back wall - top left corner of photo. Click image for larger view.

Once again store, location, & photographer unidentified.

Green Grocers of New Zealand, 1920s - #1

Interior of greengrocer's (fruit & vegetable) store, circa 1920s

If you click the above image and look closely at the rear wall upper you will see one of the posters promoting fruit listed in recent posts here as well as several others.

Would you like a bottle of fizzy drink to go with your cauli today? Grab one off the rear shelf.

Unfortunately, this store and the photographer are unidentified. Get with it, people! Write important info on the back of your photos for posterity! (Ok, yours truly regularly transgresses on this very point).