We are now well into the final push of getting ready to throw open the doors of the Well Vale shop. Our manager has been appointed and started work on the 1st. We have interviewed and appointed our shop assistants. Tradesmen are beginning to reach the end of their roles and the shop is starting to look like a shop and the prep area a prep area! We have sent the first heifer (young female cow which has never had a calf) to the abattoir and so we will have the first carcass on site on Monday. This means we will have well aged beef to sell over Christmas. Two pigs will go to the abattoir next week to make the Christmas hams.
Every day is varied, but all seem to involve spending lots of money and ending the day with a longer to do list than I started with… I’m on site a lot, liasing with the tradesmen and sorting out little niggles, making decisions and hopefully providing praise and encouragement as we go. We have been incredibly lucky with our tradesmen, with a fantastic bunch who have all worked really hard and to a very high standard, getting on with each other and working around each other. Tradesmen always seem to get a bad press, but ours have been superb – thank you guys!
I’m off to talk to suppliers now, as we try to organise a deli offering that is hopefully a little bit special and unique as well as being accessible on price, which is just the same as what we are trying to do with our home produced offering. Tomorrow morning I’m going to be making sausages and bread ready for a celebration breakfast to mark our stockman’s last day at work for us after an incredible 46 years of service. He wouldn’t want to be named on here, but he will be very much missed.
