Back to 1965 for a Bit

The photo from Waitrose Weekend of the opening of their Henley shop in 1965, by which time Mr Waite's name had lost its final E to fit neatly with Mr Rose's, is fascinating. It makes me realise that the 1960s, looking back, are almost indistinguishable from the 1950s. The prices are in shillings and pence per pound weight, the coats haven't changed much since the war, most women wear hats outdoors and everyone is happy to leave children unattended, albeit in massive prams, outside a shop. All men are at work? Or at home not shopping? If you wanted to phone someone you needed a call box. Nobody had any computer power in their pocket. No microwave meals could be purchased. Dishwasher powder probably hadn't an aisle to itself yet, nor 'foreign' food. The idea of fair trade was a way off. We need to remind ourselves how innovative simply being a supermarket was in those days and, for my part, congratulate Waitrose on still doing so many simple things well.



Ventures

There's a chain on the high street these days called Ventures. It looks like a photographer's studio shop with funk but it is much more and much less than that.

We (Liz and I) paid £25 for an hour's studio time. This entitles us to one 7" x 5" picture after the hour in the studio.

The hour in the studio was great fun as we were put through a number of scenarios and activities in a variety of clothes - not shoes though. As shoe-lovers we thought carefully about our choice of footware only to be told to take them off. It feels weird wearing business suits with no shoes on. We had to plead for a shot with shoes on at the end.

Now here's the thing. The only preview of our shots will be a projected display, set to music, in a week's time. We will see no other proofs. The shots will not be available to us electroncally (so no new blog picture yet). We can only buy them in certain formats for living room display at costs of up to £2,000 each. An album of fifteen shots is £850 or so. We can't use them to send all our Christmas card receivers a nice picture of us. Stop tittering.

So we will see all these amazing images, which will almost certainly be better than any we have ever seen before, and will find our heart-strings tugged to want to buy them.

If you are a relatively poor family, passing the shop, and see the great family portraits in the window and the £25 price for a family introductory offer, you are probably going to end up making a decision to over-spend. Yes folks, the price list includes the credit terms.

We will probably over-spend. We can afford to make over-spending decisions these days. I could buy a new car within my Mastercard limit. But just beware of this highly skilled, customer-focused retail experience, gang. They'll get you. In the nicest posible way.

Liz said that for quality time staring into each other's eyes for an hour £25 was worth the money and we should do it every week.