Being of a ‘certain age’ it’s taken me a while to get to popping my cherry as a blogger so strap in for my first attempt!
It would seem easy to focus on the strangeness of being in a country in lock-down because of Covid-19, but to be completely honest; things haven’t really changed that much here. Sure, we can’t see friends and family and like many, we’re not getting paid, but animals still need feeding, seeds need planting and jobs need doing, we’re just concentrating on what we can use our collective time and resources to achieve.
Some things are ticking along – the ewes and lambs are doing well and have moved to new pastures. The fox has made a few appearances and reduced our poultry flock. We have a surprise pregnancy with the goats so await the challenge of ‘kidding’ and Poker the pig has gone on his holidays to visit another woman in his life.
Other things are changing at speed and through the many contacts that I have made over the last few months, the ideas and the business has grown here at Yellow Door at a much faster rate than I could have imagined at the beginning of lock-down. Sure, we can’t get the catering side off the ground yet, but as our good friends at Quantock Steamers have no use for their show trailer at present, we can use it as an honesty shop and with fridges, expand our offerings.
I had the brain wave to make hot cross buns on Good Friday; over 120 of them later and our feet finally touched the ground for an hour or so on Easter Sunday! My pork scratchings, something that happened by accident, have made such a hit that I am having to arrange extra deliveries of pig skin from The Meat Men just to keep up with the demand. Anne’s pies and puddings are being delivered daily as people clean us out of stock of these tasty treats and my spare loaf of sourdough bread didn’t even hit the shelf this morning before it was snapped up.
So what does this all mean? I think that people have been shocked to the core by the availability of food in supermarkets and have turned to small, local businesses to fill the gap. Living in a rural location, farmers pass our gate all of the time, what has shocked me is the fact that even now, they are struggling to get a fair price for their meat and supermarkets are favoring imported goods over our own. The interest that these farmers are showing in what we are trying to do is humbling.
All of this got me thinking; things are slowly but surely working for us because we are working with other people who compliment our brand and ethos – what about if we work with more people? Will it help them and, as a bonus, help us in some small way too? I really do hope so.
Maybe just one or two of you reading this will make the effort to help someone too, not just in the current situation, but by making this part of your life. It doesn’t have to be much, but it could make the world of difference to someone…
A x
