Can Modern People Survive On WW2 Food Rations? | Turn Back Time | Absolute History

this channel is part of the history hits network one typical british town its high street was once its heart and soul not anymore but what if we could turn back time to the days of the butcher the baker and the candlestick maker a group of shopkeepers and their families have left the 21st century behind you are going to discover what the high street was really like your aim is to make this town fall in love with this high street again today's mantra is sell sell sell each week they're living and trading through a different era [Music] from victorian to edwardian rabbits pheasants through peace time and wartime the swinging 60s to the shocking 70s 100 years of high street history it's absolutely magical can they sell the products of the past to 21st century customers oh the poor creatures i'd be frightened to give this to the birds pimping and can they make a profit while they're at it this is unbelievably hard i don't know how these poor buggers did this in the old days if i'm really being honest i hate it tonight the high street moves into world war ii the shopkeepers and their customers are in for a shock well i'm used to selling and i'm not selling now i'm rational it's important my problem is that i've used the former rations we live in uh constrained times and things get fraught skeletors and jewelries don't get wrong but all i wanted was bloody baps how hard is it they've made the bread but can they persuade the town to love their high street in wartime i feel like i could take this all home and in one go have a good meal and starve for the rest of the week [Music] the shopkeepers are traveling forward in time to prove themselves on the world war ii high street and for the first time profit isn't everything shopkeepers had to take on a new role they became part of the official war effort regulating rationing distributing limited goods and making sure everyone got a fair share to survive struggle will be the lack of takings not me a lot of takings but we've decided that um it's the second world war and it's the dunkirk spirit there's nothing better than adversity to bring people together it's not really going to be about making lots of money it's about getting through as they arrive in the market square they are confronted with the austerity of wartime it's just very murky looking isn't it very drab no one will come in if they see it all horrible like this we're a british restaurant oh british restaurant that's what it says a restaurant mum that's not just cakes saffron's right to be worried the three eras the devlins have struggled in all their catering endeavors i didn't think i could make cakes but i really didn't think i could make them this badly what on earth have you got a center enforcing the strict rules of the era is the high street's own chamber of commerce fifth generation baker tom herbert social historian juliet gardner and successful green grocer greg wallace the holiday feel of the 1930s is over your challenge is to give the people of shepherd mallet the full world war ii experience and get you and them pulling together as a community we're not expecting you to make huge profits in fact we're not even sure you're gonna have very much to sell you are in the front line of the british war effort introducing chapter mallet to a culture of mater and mend i think we're going to find out which of you will look after each other and which of you will look after yourselves good luck ladies and gentlemen the biggest change on the high street is that the bakers has also become a british restaurant oh i think positive yeah i think this is all this fantastic oh wow oh so the government set up british restaurants and they really wanted to help with rationing and to feed people mainly workers um give them a decent midday meal they found it difficult with a tea shop i think running a restaurant is going to be a heck of a challenge after some disasters with food in previous eras the devlins are surprisingly upbeat what we have here is a very unitarian establishment for simple food along with a bakery we'll be able to do our butchers this week are selling nothing but mum the rationalist is as follows one and a half pound of meat to be sold who eats mutton these days i'm not i bet even if you asked people they wouldn't even know what mutton was mutton is the meat of a sheep over two years old so that's a huge challenge for our pusher even clothes were rationed dressmaker jill will have to persuade her customers to make do and mend instead of selling them new dresses looks a bit emptier a lot of it won't be selling stuff so much as fixing what little they do have blacksmith simon's 1930s toy shop has been replaced with a practical hardware store it's quite sparsely stocked it looks as if it's just really essential items if there's one family i think are going to find it a real shock and that's the grossest because they've been king of this street up to now if you love history then you'll love history hit we have tons of exclusive documentaries about the most important people in history that you will not find anywhere else whether you're looking to dive into life and crime in victorian london the lessons that can be learnt from the middle ages or the forgotten history that deserves to be heard history hit has a documentary for you just a click away and it's not just documentaries either we have a network of incredible history podcasts bringing you new episodes every day sign up now for a 14-day free trial and absolute history fans get 50 off their first three months just be sure to use the code absolute history at checkout for three eras the surgicans have thrived and made huge profits today's answer is sell sell sell but the war has changed everything oh for master salesman carl shortages are a shock you see what we've got on the shelves now and i bet you that's all we've got daughter safi is equally aggrieved finally got two oranges which is nothing i could eat them within an hour two oranges i usually i love oranges people are gonna be quite disappointed when we talk about shortages before the war britain was importing something like 55 million tons of food within a month at the start of the war that had dropped by two-thirds so basically the sweet fanny adams in the fridge britain was really an island under siege as well as distributing meager rations the shopkeepers will have to survive on them two ounces of butter cheese margarine lard and tea four ounces of bacon and just one egg per person per week that'll be our daily ration with it or weekly rations it's not is it we get that much cheese i could eat that in five seconds there's not a lot there well not for a week it's probably enough for a day well eat frugally but i'll still moment i'm hungry because i don't like it i'm looking for seven hundred i think it's going to be challenging because there are lots of us and you guys have got hollow legs there's probably going to be a few growly tummies around you have your own food so you like decide what you do with it no no no you don't have your own food it's not for you to say oh well that's my rusher of bacon isn't it it's about mum and i being able to use all of the russians for the family it's not all doom and gloom for rafe and the rest of the shopkeepers as they have been given a communal vegetable garden and chickens to help supplement their rations the group of local customers who have shopped with them for the past three eras won't be as lucky they can only buy rationed goods at the shops for the next week i'm a bit anxious about the size of it looking through it doesn't seem to be as much in as i thought it might be [Music] there's a war on don't you know so let's get inside this era will be the ultimate test of customer loyalty so how many children is in the family is that four boys from me i feel sorry for the people in the olden days during the war grocers and butchers became bureaucrats for the government and were expected to get to grips with a complex rationing system quickly yes i'm all right not on the envelope stop getting excited [Music] at the butchers sharp and sun have got to break the news of just how small the meat ration is what can we get and how much of it no we don't well you can get one and a half pounds of meat starvation diet then oh yeah to see how we do and at the grocers it's a similar story is that two answers each then for a week for a week so do be spurring my darling that's very shocking it was a real eye-opener because the shelves just bare so walking into a closed shop almost it looks so good i would love to have some more but obviously i can't i'm just worried it's not going to last very long two of us [Music] it's not just the customers who are disappointed with the realities of rationing this is a bit strange there's nothing here people would have come in and really seen this and would have gone [Music] what am i going to do tonight it's quite disheartening really even if we sold everything in the shop we don't get about 100 pounds because there's so little prices and if in all the others we've gotten thousands of pounds well i'm used to selling and i'm not selling now i'm rationing and it's not the same it's horrible [Music] one of the things that wasn't rationed during the war was bread at the bakers caroline is back in charge but she is restricted to making the national loaf the wartime ministry of food ordered bakers to make a wholemeal loaf with added vitamin supplements to maximize britain's nutrition but some elements of the recipe jar with modern tastes i feel really uncomfortable about putting seven and a half tablespoonfuls of salt and i live in fear of yet another salty loaf and a whole pile of complaints from people who are already going to be on the back foot because they're challenged by the shortages and the rationing anyway [Music] caroline's fears about the dough are borne out [Music] it tastes like the sea yeah i'll leave you to it the salt was added to help preserve the loaf but that's no comfort for caroline i'd just like to be able to make what i consider to be a good loaf of bread and and here we are in the fourth era and we're still making what i perceive to be well just just inferior bread and as a baker that's just it's just so frustrating caroline is right to be concerned as during the war this wholemeal loaf was universally hated in fact people dubbed it hitler's secret weapon but what will their customers make of it i'd like some white bread please it's not white it's brown oh no really yes okay i'll just have to make do with brown then the salt level what we should tell you now is relatively high would you like to try something i wouldn't it's not that bad yeah it's not that bad our first sale of the day oh lord the national loaf isn't exactly a big hit with customers but they're getting into the spirit of making do chewy it's chewy and a bit salty but fine it's cheapest yeah [Music] on the streets of shepton mallet blacksmith simon and dressmaker jill have teamed up to introduce their customers to a culture of make do and mend i think it's hugely important still continue to strive to be self-sufficient there could be a crisis just around the corner at any time they're collecting scrap and clothes that can be mended and recycled this is something you want an edge to put on yeah the blacksmiths were the first recyclers make doing mend is just second later to us in wartime the government encouraged everyone to recycle their scrap metal for the war effort in shepton mallet they collected 18 tons to build a tent oh wow but the bodice is really pretty yeah in the 40s things weren't available you know you couldn't get fabric you couldn't buy clothes off the peg so the people with the skills to make things would have been um which is great feeling do you feel good that you've actually managed to to be able to recycle some of this yeah is it better than just throwing it away yep it's so much bigger [Music] to make their rations go as far as possible the shopkeepers have pooled their resources [Music] grocer's wife debbie is taking on responsibility for putting together a communal meal every night i just want some to be really close and to embrace what's coming ahead and uh i think what kinds are going to get them i reckon this area now it's going to become quite a meeting place because everybody's just seemed to gravitate here today and everyone's coming and saying oh this is really cool and then they're sitting down and they're just staying longer [Music] [Applause] [Music] butchers andrew and michael have opened early as they want to catch the shepton mallet breakfast tray it's not bacon they're cooking but macon made from sheep not pigs makon is skewered mutton we're turning a chicken we're taking we make bacon out of mutton that's where we've got macon macon murders mossages but it might be a tough sell mutton they say as tough as mutton that was the little boot i'm confident that we can get people to try our american i said whether they will buy it will be another issue come on get your making we're in a war hard times come on we can make sheep taste like pig just as nice best thing you can have for your breakfast come on mutton bacon maker is it mum it certainly is mutton why aren't there many pigs so there isn't enough of anything so you've got to make the most of it everyone wants bacon so what we're doing is making bacon out of anything we can get our ants on [Music] there you go interesting seriously oh it's very tasty that's all right actually that really is all right making it's an easy sell to be honest because it tastes like bacon everyone recognizes the flavors in there you've got a slight mutton hue in the background but it's not negative the proof of the pudding is in the eating is it not the butchers have managed to satisfy their customers and at the grocers carl and debbie have a scheme to do the same we were a bit sneaky in the last era and we've actually hid some food we knew there's a war coming so we've um decided to keep some stuff back that we knew that would be under rationing rules so we could uh one keep our customers happy and two obviously uh keep the family's finances in good shape for the war there's all kids in here yep yes yeah excuse me yeah well thanks to self harry if the ministry of food find out you're going to prison not me all right [Applause] [Music] wow and we got sugar spaghetti i think that's an amazing stash aaron we're going to get it under the counter keep it on the counter and then when customers are coming in saying have we got this have we got that so you know but we have got this and unfortunately it you know it's pretty expensive we've got brown sugar brown sugar that's right gold dust so i can make yourself almost 10 quid a bag couldn't we now we know the likes of mr blake and mrs payne they've got little kiddies they'll want ketchup when we've got ketchup i think it's got to be a good five or a jar though well there were 250 there last time you don't want to rob them blind well no because they've got an account that you want them to spend their money here they will spend their money here that way that's the whole idea of the plan it's a coming plan we'll get that covered up or something [Music] whilst the grocers are helping themselves the bakers have a hard task ahead they need to open the british restaurant and feed the town you'll be serving a group of thirty school children at one pm okay where are we gonna put thirty kids [Music] the other side problem with their stuff today is that mostly everything's to do with carrot example carrot fudge boiled carrots served with some orange essence and that's it during the war it was believed that carrots helped the raf see in the dark but this was a cunning ruse by the government to conceal from germany the invention of radar and also get rid of a glut of carrots we've got this recipe now for carol age which is just swede and carrot and then put in a muslin and just squeezed out yeah no no no we tell them afterwards yes sweden characters [Music] for the main course two slightly more familiar wartime classics spam fritters and corned beef hash i felt just like a school dinner lady i thought it was bad enough cooking for six of us all the time but 30 people definitely school dinners at the grocers customers are still getting used to the realities of rationing you wouldn't want to wait in keys all the time i wouldn't have the same two meeting queues like this they're the same ex and your weekly allowance each yes you're allowed one egg each is that right [Music] we've got these wheat flakes but for our special customers we've got some on the back yes two right excuse me the [Music] contempt of a few of my goodies but these can't be on account they've got to be so shredded we've got conflicts cream crackers lions tea three are some shredded beets so are you sure you can be the first only customers in chapter mallet to get cane sugar during the war in that case it's mine it's got to be a fibre piper there's got to be anything so we've got these right now as you know before the war these were around about uh two good a pack but unfortunately four times now i'm afraid they've doubled their four pound pack goodness all right that's right [Music] all right have you got a bag mrs marsh special one there i don't know what's great [Music] we've been doing the back yeah oh we got some special i think carl looked after us rather well he said we were special customers which was really nice that was quite exciting to be offered something perhaps other people wouldn't you know i like that i've made myself something already i might make what christ over tenor already so it's a good start of the week so would you be interested come and have a look at my little goodies i've got um some really good things here how much the cream crackers it's three quid a box so that's cool how much is it all whispering two quid for tillerson i'm the local speed as they say i'll get it for an emergency as shocking as they might be carl's prices are actually quite reasonable in wartime luxuries such as melons could change hands for as much as two pounds a whopping 68 pounds in today's money one bag hiding jobs yeah i'm in the black market i've got no knowledge of it in real life but i mean that's what i would do if it was me and there's a chance i might cut the world i know by the end of the week that trade be empty back at the british restaurant the school kids are arriving can the bakers succeed in winning them over to wartime fair [Music] first up is the caroline [Music] perhaps the corned beef will go down better the meal hasn't been a success and there are a lot of leftovers i wasn't expecting the reaction to be good you know but they said that the spam was horrible the corned beef was horrible well to be honest that's what everyone would eat so if they don't like it then tough they wouldn't survive back then my feet have never hurt so much ever it's just i know it's such a witch but they hurt there's no let up for caroline and nigel they have to now prepare the next day's national loaf debbie has also asked them to make bread rolls and she's got a special dinner of muttonburgers and rhubarb crumble planned for tonight's communal meal but nigel has a problem with it debbie wants to make burgers in a bun but what we have to do bearing in mind the period is use what we've got and we've got bread left over from the lunch today so we'll just have to use that whilst the bakers are working hard the sergersons have discovered the communal veg patch better than nothing during the war everyone was encouraged to dig for victory by growing their own food land everywhere was taken over for growing even the gardens at buckingham palace this vegetable garden is meant for all the shopkeepers but the surgesons have a different plan yeah i think this is really good because it's like almost like free stock just fill up that basket as much as you can getting it okay and then we'll pull out more tomorrow if we need more if we sell them all it's like a massive profit isn't it man we could probably charge two pound 95 yeah we'll sure to feed everyone and make some money i think selling it's only the right thing you wouldn't give it away dig for victory is what they say and that's what we're doing [Music] it's been a triumphant afternoon in the garden but debbie has just found out that nigel hasn't made her bread rolls i just can't do it anymore who do you think nigel yeah but all i wanted was bloody baps how hard is it they've made the bread that's the hard bit rolling the baps is easy scouses and juries don't get on but at the end of the day regardless of whether we're going or not we live we're going to live the period um and it's just it's just a difference of opinions that's all you know she's right now no she's wrong and i'm right all he needed to contribute for dinner tonight was to make babs i've made the crumble i was making the burger mix the baked potatoes in the oven you know how i just i don't know how i can be nice all the time when he's being an absolute toss pot and it's really made me cross um a bit of a mound over more hill but um we'll get through it but i don't feel comfortable now that's the difficult part i don't want any dinner i can it's not burning having said that oh god her crumble is burnt oh my god that's not funny okay it's not funny there's nothing i can do about them you know i could smell the burn and say when i came in it's not rocket science you've got stuff in the oven that they're gonna burn i'm not i'm not really happy just to keep uh providing everybody if i'm not gonna get something back in return it's the final straw for debbie and caroline is now in the firing line caroline hear me out if you give that bread anyway then where can you just turn them into bats does it matter what form that bread takes have you tried to eat a burger in sliced bread to say actually what we're contributing it's not to your specific requirements it's crazy just what i expected that was all but if we can't deliver that then really well you could have delivered she just chose not to i think to say that we chose not to makes it out to be a deliberate thing and that's unfair with the wartime spirit now in tatters tonight's communal meal is cancelled [Music] it doesn't matter who was writing who was wrong it wasn't about that it was just about that someone was upset and i didn't want them to be upset anymore [Music] it's an air raid [Music] so what we're supposed to do now get in that little shelter okay people i think we should kind of go anybody here on the side door please nigel is acting as air raid warden responsible for the safe evacuation of the high street come on come on this is siren come on go this is only a drill if this was the real thing they would only have 12 minutes to get to a shelter before the bombs started to fall into the side door shops most of the shopkeepers head for the cellar but the butchers and the blacksmith have to get into their morrison shelter a small steel cage under the kitchen table on the corner this is a bit cozy in it [Music] the bakers and grocers will have to spend the evening together after all my heart was just pounding the siren makes you makes you move we could be anywhere for days would you get in trouble for not going to your shelter no you just die don't you there's no trouble in that if the house was bombed and you weren't under ear then you'd be the one that died imagine if this was covered in rubble yeah how the hell would you get out you could do one would you because it wasn't just the big cities of britain that were bombed in shepton mallet the skies were alive with enemy bombers and more than 200 bombs were dropped attempting to destroy the nearby railway line people used to have to live on their wits yeah do you know and that made them well i don't know what made them it must have made them very different people to how they started much harder than oslo oh yes oh much tougher it does kind of bring it home this really did happen and just coming actually out of this and seeing if your house everything you had was still here that must have been the worst thing of all or maybe if you'd lost somebody or somebody been left behind and you were told that you couldn't come back the you and f panda or i was left behind it'd be so really upsetting actually i came out thinking that chloe was ahead of me and ridiculously i don't know how it happened but chloe was behind me i was absolutely panic stricken now i knew he forgot you don't worry things are back to normal after last night's air raid [Music] and even caroline and debbie have gained some perspective on their argument what happened yesterday as much as you'd like to it not have happened it did happen and you just have to deal with it and get on i've been able to see caroline and we've had a good chat and business as usual really everybody gets stressed and strung out and actually you know i could have been perhaps a bit more sympathetic and you just have to put it to one side you know because there's a war on as the dust settles everyone is back to work simon has reopened his forge to mend customers salvage and is making good on his claim that blacksmiths were the first recyclers the amount of tools that i've got to to sharpen to refurbish to resurrect from the dead uh is unbelievable the tine's broken off i've got a cut nail here which is actually carbon steel and if i can try and fire weld that on there i can re repair this and get it back to work in order oh that's nice it's just the material i the people of shepton mallet are discovering the joys of make do and mend okay it's done well night dress made out of balance sheet with the help of jill customers are seeing new possibilities in their old clothes although it's too big for me now what i thought was if i had to cut off where the pockets go to do you see what i mean so slightly shorter and then can you see at the back if it could be more of a fitted shape at the grocers it's business as usual it's my little black book madam it's a black market but the chamber of commerce are back they've been talking to some of the surgicans customers and juliet is appalled i'm not pleased about what i've heard about carl and debbie in the family the problem is carl's an entrepreneur and what was what was applauded in peace time you know making a making a decent living you know pulling a few tricks here and there in wartime it's frowned on it undermines society it undermines the war effort and what's more it's criminal activity [Music] hello julia hello carl debbie right carl and debbie i've been talking to some of your customers and quite honestly you haven't been playing the game i am shocked the reason russian was introduced it was about fair shares for everybody they didn't want it so that just those could who could afford it could have more everybody had to feel that the sacrifice was being equally born and to be honest i'm horrified to say i think you're abusing it what have you got to say um well yes we have been running a little bit of a black market i must admit we have um i've also favored more others more than others i mean if people have got the money then we've let them have the uh the black market products that's looking after number one that's not looking after the community i understand that yeah it's serious this and i'm going to have to make you realize how serious it was now this is a criminal activity and i have to tell you the government came down very heavily what i am going to recommend is a fine that fine is going to be a hundred pounds that translates into today's money nearly four and a half thousand pounds now i hope that will bring it home to you just what you're doing in wartime okay goodbye thank you goodbye so we have nothing to say it doesn't matter though it's not about making money is that it does it's sort of i think we haven't taken any money this week doesn't matter we'll be in debt for the next few years i really don't don't care honestly i was looking after my family and i'm really strong about that my family is very important and they come first and then if there's anything left for the rest of the country then i'm sure there would be a money a small family then it's fine so i've got no conscience of that whatsoever honestly while carl is unrepentant it's left to the bakers to try and instill the wartime spirit in chapter mallet that's the fact they've got to cook for an hour and a half if you if they're too small they'll just disintegrate it's round two of the british restaurant they've got 15 people coming for lunch and two hours to prepare two wartime classics rabbit stew and braised sheep's tongue [Music] they smell terrible actually and and also i've looked at what the instructions are and it says by the time that when they're cooked you have to start taking out all the bones and and skin them there's not gonna be anything left look at that i think i've never even done any sort of thing like this before and i know somehow what i'm doing for dessert it's eggless date and raisin pudding it's very starchy it just i think it was an era of stodge [Music] i think we've pulled it together that's down to the children as well because they they straight away know what's expected of them they got the veg going and with that jack's made the dumplings so it's absolutely brilliant to be honest with you and we don't want the children knowing this because actually you know they'll only demand more from us but actually we're really really pleased with the way the kids muck in hopefully what you've seen today is there's a family working together bakers think they've cracked it but it's the diners who will decide whether the meal is a success [Music] right these local pensioners actually lived through world war ii and they'll know the genuine article go and put that milk out on that table actually no yes on that table and then no actually wait wait what about him yeah yeah well he's dead table one [Music] two rabbit stews see this well-oiled machine here the rabbit stew you used to get rabbit during the war and it was a treat if you managed to get a rabbit i wouldn't like to tell you what we had in the war half of it when the swelling it was very nice yes lots of nice coverage as well yeah i appreciated having that because i haven't had tongue cooked like that probably since then actually all right thank you we've had an absolutely lovely meal it put me back to my childhood when i was about 10 or 11 and it tasted exactly the same it was gorgeous do you thought it was very authentic yes oh yes the whole the whole thing has been authentic you you've i feel any way having lived through it that i'm i'm reliving it again now it was lovely because i met up with a school friend that i hadn't seen for over 70 years really nice what is is now growing in here is the sense of community in shepton people are sitting it is people are spending more longer in here than they need to there's no urgency to go even if they're just buying a loaf of bread they're staying in and other people coming in and chatting and i just think it's lovely caroline is seeing the upside of the war but after days of rationing shepton mallet is finding it tough tired hungry it's totally stressed out been waiting um for one hour 45 minutes and just on a queue it's really painful i've actually found it rather anxiety-provoking queuing up waiting to get into a shop where you're hoping there's going to be some food do you have any rice oh i would really like rice actually me too is there anything else you have around the back that i might be just what you see on the shelves is everything you've got whatever if there's anything i can buy without a ration book there is rabbit [Music] anything else rabbit rabbit that it my problem is that i've used that for my rations well i'm trying to feed four but it's a bit hard customers queueing up and we've gotten out to sell them because there's nothing still so you can't can't give me anything today i'm sorry but we live in constrained times i feel like i could take this all home and in one go have a good meal and starve for the rest of the week i was hoping you could actually just extend my ration i honestly couldn't get anything anywhere else i'm going to stop with the customers feeling the pinch the high street is about to experience even more upheaval i comparing news clearly andrew it's very likely that a man with your skills would be uh called to offer your services to the catering corps we would like you to leave the high street territory in world war ii men from 18 to 41 were conscripted into the services which means grosser's son harry is being sent off too carl is joining him to give debbie an authentic taste of what it was like to lose the men for a second time in a generation she'll step up to the metal she always does she's putting on it but she does miss me she does love me and i'm vice versa i miss her and love her so it's going to be quite sad really i always cope on my own that's what i do but it's not the point i don't want to cope on my own i won't call to be here and harry this adventure's not really turning out as an adventure in this era [Music] bakers were initially a protected trade so nigel is staying put while debbie may miss carl for butcher's boy michael it's an opportunity to run the sharp empire that's gonna war and i'm not too bothered about that because i get to run the shot which would be really great [Music] but the chamber of commerce has a surprise for michael her name is anne davidson a lady butcher from scotland he might be a bit upset because he's never worked with a lady before and it's always worked with his dad so he'll be a bit upset because he's not in charge [Music] hello hi man you must be michael i am yes i'm the new manager of the shop i know your dad's away to war you're going to be manager yes all right so that kind of needs your boss tonight yes i can have that my shot and i'm afraid i'm gonna have to run it oh well i'm sorry michael you'll just have to put up with me you're only 14 michael you can't just shop your own okay michael i'll go get my coat on and then we'll get some customers in and start selling all right oh i'm not going to be able to take orders from the scotch with the men at war women took over men's jobs not just in factories and munitions plants but in shops too it served the ministry lots of money just to send her somewhere else even now a lady butcher can cause quite a stir i don't mean to be rude but yes i'm used to seeing a lady in there have you qualified have you trained us about you yes at four it's come such a surprise to me to see a female culture not that i'm sexist or anything you know they look at you and you think i can't picture i look at you you've got to prove yourself all right michael you put this away from me please you got a note of the price michael you need to get tidied up now for more customers coming in he doesn't like me he's staring and he doesn't like me because he thought he was in charge that paper maker please don't like being told what to do at all no no no no that's just not gonna happen very smoothly it's not just michael who is feeling down everyone on the high street is finding wartime grueling i never realized they worked just so hard for nothing it's been a really tiring day i was up at six this morning we're still on the rations breakfasts aren't very decent lunches are not very decent we've run out of milk so we're down to black tea usually if i want something i could have it and now if i want something i have to i can't so it's a bit you know it's vital that they keep their spirits up so the chamber of commerce have organized a dance to boost morale and jill the dressmaker wants to look her best it's so i look like i'm wearing stockings look it look it works doesn't it yeah compared to how white my legs were before it does work in wartime beauty had to be improvised wonky make do creativity was key that feels straight to be honest the scenes aren't too bad a used match could become an eyebrow pencil beetroot lipstick [Music] britain had nearly six years of stress and monotony in wartime that's why dances became so popular as an escape [Music] they do look amazing though don't they absolutely would you like the stars i'd love to [Music] to actually let your hair down like this and laugh because actually yeah there have been times we've cried rather than laughed and we've actually just been yeah you know just so so happy and relaxed tonight has been fab really fab yeah been really amazing if we had more nights like this you would have happy people working the shops every day don't push it it's a real shame that something terrible like a wall has to happen to bring people together and to bring out you know the community spirit it's a shame that um we can't remember those bad times and keep that good community spirit when things are better [Music] the next morning and it's an early start [Music] except for michael the butcher's boy who seems to have forgotten his duties a bit late this morning aye no alarm clock you see oh well you need to get that sorted then wouldn't you this wouldn't do coming in this time in the morning to run our business it doesn't matter really on this day because chetsamala is dead as a darnell okay that's not brace michael that's flank oh well it looked like breath no that's flank makeup just show you how much i don't know i'll next you anyway well you're only 14 so you'll not know everything about me he's too cocky mixing was happening and didn't even know that was a flank at the dressmakers customers are picking up their refashioned clothes your kate has been remodelled and shortened do you want to try it out let's try it out i hope you like it i also noticed the lining was a bit ripped so i i was i heard that for you as well just under the arm showing them that maker and mend can be achieved and can be really fun and you can end up with some really kind of cool stuff from nothing i'm really pleased with that i see i'll get so much more oh doesn't it look nicer downstairs simon is doing his bit right this is very sharp mate thank you so i've actually put a real sharp edge on it you have being part of this experiment is really a fantastic opportunity for me to demonstrate my skills and how people like me colleagues in the business this sort of business can be useful to people in the present day oh my god so you've got a workable for brilliant so i can dig my potatoes up with ease now the war is drawing to an end on the high street which means the men will soon return and reclaim their jobs for michael that's a relief i'm ordered to go back home now michael thank you very much thanks uh see ya thanks for your work thank you michael see you bye [Music] i'm not gonna miss her at the grocer's debbie's doing her final accounts 22 22 51 60 65 72 75 i've done all the tottenham totten up of everything and you know what for the fact that we only took 31 pounds worth of under counter goods i really think was it worth it in the long run you know we've got a massive fine and i am gutted really [Music] v-e day saw the biggest street party britain had ever witnessed today just as they did in 1945 the people of shepparton mallet are bringing dishes made from their rations to share with the shopkeepers [Music] cheers [Music] thank you the chamber of commerce are back to find out what the customers made of their wartime experience is there anything about this wartime britain high street that you would like your kids to inherit one thing that came out of the war which was we're all in this together let's not be greedy let's all help each other you managed a week would you like to manage two months or a year it would have been too much fun that we could do it got used to putting less butter on things but we got used to it as i stood there in the queue i i realized that we customers had never met each other before and and i was talking to people who lived in shepparton that i'd never met but never spoken to before and it was all sort of bringing us together people went without yet are still talking about what a wonderful community spirit it was now okay to build a community spirit at the same time as you're hungry i mean how powerful was the feeling here i think that's right i mean and the people were talking about cueing and imagine queueing you know our you might queue for several hours and still not got what you wanted after that but people talked about getting to know people um in the queues they talked about wanting to come back into shepherd mallets they found it a more sociable place and they felt they've got to know each other in a way that they hadn't before well the grocers of course controversy this week i mean they can't help it they're natural sales people they want to make a profit and i take my house to them there they really didn't understand a the era they were in and how tough it was and b what people would have thought of them if there was plenty of black market trading going on would you feel left out that you had good heavens now because otherwise if you go on like that the whole system will just fall apart vaughan actually said that she bought some stuff on black market i was totally affronted i thought why wasn't i offered it because i had money i could have bought that stuff the high street really did come together as a community and they were all going without to then suddenly find out that they had sacrificed while others were cheating has caused a fair bit of anger he was profiteering he was selling goods off the rations to turn a quick buck and he did it in wartime and that's not on the baker's have had a fantastic week yeah this has really been their era i think they've been exemplary i think they are just really terrific people who actually share and care and that's exactly what you would have needed in this era i don't think they've had to try that out i think that's then [Music] [Applause] [Music] you just can't fault these people they've really taken you know they've taken us to their hearts and i i actually feel the same about them we are just a complete community now and it's it just means so much i don't know what we're going to do with these shopkeepers go back it's brought this place this town alive jill's a lovely girl what do you make of the dressmaker she's made the most fantastic contribution i think more effort she's trying to show the people of ships and mallet that they don't have to buy anything they've got a lot of stuff in their wardrobes that they can make make over and make nice simon you know has really enjoyed this era because he's found himself very useful in the community and that's what he wanted to be right from the start he's shown people that there is another way you don't just have to buy cheap things an obsolescence you can actually buy something and have it repaired and keep it going and make do and mend they've shown people that you know things don't have to be disposable there is an afterlife but simon's days on the high street are drawing to an end after the war as britain increasingly embraced mass-produced disposable goods demand for blacksmiths disappeared i'll miss this forge absolutely immensely this this to me this this is me this is what i do this is my environment and it's fantastic absolutely fantastic and i will miss it really really with a sad and heavy heart it's time for simon to say goodbye to the high street and he's made them a farewell gift so i've taken all sorts of bits and pieces to produce a frame from the scrap that the townspeople of shepton mallet gave me this week we were the world's first recyclers and we're bloody good at it so this is my present to the town [Applause] [Music] [Applause] it's sad to see my craft disappear from the high street but at the same time i'm hoping that by doing this project i'm going to give it a new lease of life others aren't so sad to see the back of the wall i didn't like world war ii mainly because we had nothing to sell that's what i'm all about that's my life that's what i do i'm a showman i sell food i sell products and i absolutely sweet fanny adams to sell for everybody that has entered into the spirit of it it's made it's made the community and the shopkeepers just so much closer i mean we are a real team now all of us what an absolutely amazing week devlin's your commitment to this high street has been unbelievable that i think is probably the spirit that actually did get written through really tough times well done grocers oh the controversy bad boys and girls not the spirit that got through the blitz at all got caught we've been done and that's life but we'll carry on the business keep going and watch this space [Music] one typical british town its high street was once its heart and soul [Music] not anymore but what if we could turn back time to the days of the butcher the baker and the candlestick maker a group of shopkeepers and their families have left the 21st century behind you are going to discover what the high street was really like your aim is to make this town fall in love with this high street again today's mantra is sell sell sell each week they're living and trading through a different era [Music] from victorian to edwardian rabbits pheasants through peace time and wartime the swinging 60s to the shocking 70s 100 years of high street history it's absolutely magical can they sell the products of the past to 21st century customers oh the poor creatures i'd be frightened to give this to the birds pimping and can they make a profit while they're at it this is unbelievably hard i don't know how these poor buggers did this in the old days if i'm really being honest i hate it tonight the shopkeepers enter the swinging 60s where it's all change so i'm not a dressmaker anymore but have you done where's my butcher gone why are we not bakers competition hits the high street the general store doesn't stand a chance they haven't got the famous chance of getting anywhere near us surgicals have got an advantage over us so we're going to take that advantage away the battle lines are drawn now we just have to commence battle and history put some out of business all of the old ways of thinking and working are gone forever but what will customers think you are changing the whole community here and taking the whole heart out of it i hope you can sleep at night that's all i can say [Music] for the somerset town of shepton mallard world war ii has ended shelves just bare so walking into a close shop you're allowed one egg each it's here what are we gonna do now the shopkeepers are traveling forward in time to the early 1960s high street where every shop has been totally transformed in 1960s britain the economy was booming [Music] self-service and mass production meant cheaper food and more choice britain had never had it so good there's going to be a drastic change from the bleak rations of the second world war should have a lot more fun this year 60s is all about the fashion all about being brave with what you're wearing and making a statement well the 60s were time with plenty wasn't it youth music and everything else yeah we're looking forward to it making sure that they stick to the rules of the era is the chamber of commerce fifth generation baker tom herbert social historian juliet gardner and successful green grocer greg wallace welcome everybody to the 1960s and i bet you're really pleased to leave the austerity of wartime behind well so was the whole of great britain the 1960s were a remarkable era of transition the british public embraced self-service shops but not everyone was happy with it so the challenge for you is going to be to find out what your customers really want and be able to respond to that you have to concentrate on a new consumer the teenager and your challenge really is to see whether you can tempt modern teenagers back to the high street and shops stopped being complementary to each other competition really kicked in you are going to experience what small traders went through in a bid to just stay in business please go and see your shops and good luck [Music] last time bakers the devlins were feeding the town from a wartime restaurant but their shop has totally transformed milk bar oh that's what we want the milk bar sold a new american dream to britain's youth in the form of milkshakes burgers and frothy coffees all to a 60s soundtrack we can see some major diversification going on in the bakers they're now a milk bar we were expecting a surprise but we weren't expecting that sort of surprise that is huge because their challenge is to tempt modern teens in and i think with their young lads they've got they've got a chance of doing that they might even make some money this era if we were out of our comfort zone during the last period we're way way outside our comfort zone the 60s teenagers really love these milk bars if you can bring that experience to the teenagers of today they're just going to make a killing milkshakes music that's a winner that's a winner [Music] butcher andrew sharp and son michael also have a surprise in store during the 60s tens of thousands of butchers lost their jobs as butchery moved out of shops and into processing plants but there was a way to stay in business general staff got a general stop you having a lot the general store amalgamated hardware and food [Music] i don't think andrew's going to be very happy i mean he's a real skilled butcher and all of his meat's taken away oh shovels tea strainers wallpaper is there anything we don't sell meat we've got ourselves bloody butchers he's still going to serve the needs of the high street i think let me get this right so what you're saying is people have loved the butcher but now they're going to go in and buy a watery cab i can't see how an absolute expert in slaughtered beast can all of a sudden become an expert on shovels to be honest i don't have a clue about any of this stuff this is certainly not what i'm about that's for sure across the square wow the surgeson's family grocer has become partly self-service but what will carl's customers make of it they've enjoyed one-to-one personal service since the 1870s and if you'd like to see seat they'll get it for you and have it organized thanks thank you very much going to be a loss for this high street not to have the surgeson so at the front of it i mean they've really been out on the high street pulling people in and now they're going to be very much in the background do you think people will miss that i think it's going to divide people some people are going to really like the convenience and other people are going to miss the personal service it'd be very interesting to see how it plays out well we're just going to make an absolute killer aren't we both the shop is bigger with a wide range of pre-packed convenience foods we're gonna have bread we're gonna have fruit and veg so i reckon we're gonna clean up quite happily [Music] but the biggest change of all on the high street awaits dressmaker jill that's a hairdressing song oh my god my dressmakers is gone until now jill has sewed her way through three eras from edwardian to the 1940s but during the 1960s cheap off-the-peg clothing meant that bespoke was out of fashion completely absolutely shocked so jill will have to adapt to survive and in the 60s the hair and beauty industry was booming one of the reasons why hair dressing became so important was because fear and feel women were wearing hats i mean after all if you think in the 50s women never went out hardly without a hat well of course by the 60s young women weren't wearing hats at all so of course hair became really important there are scissors here which worries me i really don't think i should be cutting anybody's hair jill's not actually a hairdresser she now owns a beauty salon and an hairdresser so it's like completely out of her comfort zone i feel very daunted by it to be honest i don't want to upset anybody i know i know what girls are like about their hair there's going to be a very steep learning curve involved in this era but she doesn't need to worry for long the chamber of commerce have sent jill her first employee [Music] [Laughter] the shopkeepers have all been given manuals by the chamber of commerce instructing them on how to run their 1960s businesses the way you display your goods will be crucial they are silent salesmen and they need to sell themselves to your customers the first task for the surgicans is to decide how to display their stock have gaps in between them you're never going to fill all your shelves you know there's no wells otherwise you can have one shelf full of food and everything else empty the advent of self-service meant customers interacted with the product not the shopkeeper strategists to encourage customers to part with their cash quickly developed eye level shelving was for the best sellers in 60s speak that's the a-line the main road the main airline is cereal yeah all right so are you happy like that no we're just saying this should go up the whole lot light layer eye line is a line and that's my eye line yeah this is meant to be our most important shelf and the whole thing is just cereal why did you tell me once i've actually put the whole shelf on he tells me once i've filled the whole shelf of bloody cereal stupid ass do you reckon the surgeons love bread definitely for the first time on the high street there is direct competition as the grocers and the general store sell many identical items and this will look a million times better than mr sharks because he's old hat he is old-fashioned so now we look clean shiny and pristine he looks dower and old the sharps are attempting an eye-catching display of their own matter no but having that across there look awesome right what can we do about signage because neither of us can write you could say something like flying here for the best service in town personal service no that that's a bit crap that right we'll think about signage later we could empty this rubbish stuff out of this basket and we could have like see some jams in it or no i don't know that's obviously i have a basket of eggs you're gonna break them let's do things that we're not gonna damage and lose money on right okay go and get that jam from around there yes sir and hurry up about it [Music] they haven't exactly got the competition running scared have you seen that windows display it's absolutely crap yeah that's all right with the butcher and the grocer now selling bread the bakers are taking delivery of milk in past eras they've provided the town with handmade bread specialist machinery and a plethora of chemical improvers meant that bread could be made in a factory in just four hours as opposed to 12 hours in a traditional baker's putting 20 000 bakery staff out of work during the sixties why are we not bakers we're just a victim of change don't you feel like you sold yourself well of course of course of course any expertise that you've had previously and any need that the community have had for you has now gone we can try and adapt as we're trying to do here but the reality is where it's the vagaries of the marketplace wherever people's choices are we have to keep abreast of that or go under no more bread no more bread but we've got an alternative at the moment at the moment yeah [Music] the sharps are getting a delivery too at least there's meat that's crap they don't go in there it does it doesn't actually take at least one of the dials off anywhere it looks like he's got some chilled meat now that's not the sort of meat he likes to sell it's pre-packed crap so he won't have the same heart and love well he might try and lie but deep down i know he won't like having something whereas i'll send anything for a buck during their time on the high street andrew and son michael have sold the town a giant victorian pig edwardian game and wartime mutton but his 1960s stock is pre-prepped and already packed which means the grocer can sell it too this is a natural progression from being a butcher's to actually being a corner shop it's commercial bacon not dry cured by yours the ham again is cooked in a big factory so it's the start of the wonderful world of pink goo welcome one and all over the eras the shopkeepers have built relationships with a group of customers who have pledged to shop only on the historic high street they've shopped through 90 years of history but for the first time they face a dilemma we seem to have some competition and although i get on with both shopkeepers it will be interesting as to where i decide to shop actually i'm wondering how that's going to work out so i'm looking forward to going in there and trying to get the lowest price i can get it's difficult because i've built up a friendship with both shops so i don't know i think it would have to be down to economics really but in the early 60s it was manufacturers rather than shopkeepers who set the prices of goods known as resale price maintenance it meant prices didn't vary much from shop to shop so customers will have to make their choices based on something other than price hello good morning how are you yeah good thank you the surgicans are offering a radical new way of shopping i also got a leaflet of how to do self-service shopping everything's all priced for a nation that had suffered the stranglehold shopkeepers had on customer choice during the war self-service was a breath of fresh air it's nice to be able to pick stuff up and you know look at the back of a packet and put it back in your basket and take out again yeah great but some found it baffling oh dear dear so i'm going to collect my own stuff now do i yeah so i've got a flyer i'm telling you how to do your own service i really don't know how i'm going to coach um [Music] so i'm sure my poster boy with everybody but it is really sad isn't it there's no relationship whatsoever it's there and this town has got used to good old-fashioned service does that mean i have to take my shopping with me it does yes there's no delivery service anymore no and no accounts anymore no accounts either a bit of a shame about not having the delivery anymore and the kind of personal service that i had a few decades ago is missing as well now personal cross road to delivery i believe he does yes oh that might put a different light on it it might do yes we might nip across to your colleague over the road and see see what he might offer it yeah he might not have all the wider ranges we've got but i'm sure you'll be able to help you okay despite the surgicals confidence about their new look store it seems many customers don't want to move with the times we don't do deliveries and that is a downside at the moment i feel like morning ladies would you like to come in good morning this morning you're as welcome here girls as you are at home andrew and michael are keen to highlight the services they have on offer we've got a van we can deliver delivery is free as long as you pay us nothing unlike this you can have tickets unlike the you can have credit we've got the green shield stamps as well oh yeah two stamps for a shilling green shield stamps were the 1960s version of the loyalty card at the end of the week the customer of the most stamps gets to pick a prize from the cabinet do i have to join anything no you just have that book and that box of money oh yes please i'll have a book so if you buy lots of us you get a prize well what can i start with um oh some marmalade could i have a job marmalade absolutely it's a nice atmosphere you still feel like it's kind of that family owned they're behind the counter together and they're giving you that service it's a nice service to have in the grocery shop they're lovely but i prefer mr sharp and his son they're so helpful they're cheerful they're happy and that goes a long way with a customer at the devlin shop customers who've bought their bread since the 1870s are coming to terms with the loss of the high street bakers what happened to the bakery i came in to get some bread if you go to the grocers what you'll find is they're stocking what i think seventy seventy odd percent of the people were eating which is the white sliced mass-produced loaf there's another service bites the dust they've actually stopped making bread so now i'm stuck with two shops with white bread it looks pretty tasteless actually so i'm going to miss that the core customers are genuinely wanting bread and the business that actually was so essential in previous eras and people had come to rely on has gone and it's the start of the slippery slope while some are lamenting the passing of old trades jill's having to get to grips with a whole new one before she starts trading the chamber of commerce have sent her and naomi to a specialist 60s hair salon in london for expert tuition i'm going to show you today how to recreate three fabulous styles gonna have the flip the bufo and the beehive fantastic now we're going to do the flip in the 1960s what was important was the volume on the top of the hair a hairstyle like the flip came very popular because of the singer lulu in the early 60s just brush it around your hand yeah that's good oh okay very nice oh that's looking great it's so recognizable isn't it such an iconic style next up for jill and naomi it's a 60s staple the buffalo that is some quiff people were inspired by singers or actresses so the buffon like we're creating here is very british bardot fantastic so now we're going to do the beehive this is the most iconic hairstyle of the 1960s so we're going to backcomb all of this it has to be quite big in the 60s it was all about the bigger the better still is darling take all the hair together and really twist it voila that is the beehive oh it looks fantastic having all the professional tips and just little tricks of the trade that we've learned today has made me feel an awful lot more confident that i can carry this off tomorrow when we've got real customers coming into the salon back in shepton the devlin seem busy enough even if they're not making bread your chips have just been cooked they shouldn't be too long at all my wife's sandwich is a little bit burnt i think let's have to see the head chef about how i'm afraid one vanilla milkshake is that right oh you've had one so we just spent 20 minutes doing two orders that didn't exist he didn't tell me which table it was he didn't write down which table it was shut up no it's hard jesus christ i'm helping mum no shut up now she's like me i think i've gone to brazil together despite the teething problems the customers seem to be liking it we used to come into milk bars like this and have a really good time it's absolutely marvelous really enjoying it but this lot are 40 years too old in the 60s most teens were working and earning around 150 pounds a week in today's money 70 percent of that was disposable income so it's no surprise the high street provided them with somewhere to go today it's a very different story there's never anything to do in shepton walk around just go to the park or like tesco's skate park people get drunk but there's nothing else to do i just come down there about one and then stay here until 10. but the milk bar closes with its potential customers unaware that it's a place for them it's the end of the first day of trading and adapting to change continues above the shops [Music] i've got a bar oh isn't that lovely wouldn't you just want that in your own living room what's happened on the high street has come it's quite a shock to me you can see the change more so now than any era we've done so far and i think it already spells the end for for some it's quite worrying i feel quite nervous about this week i am completely out of my comfort zone for jill it's time to put her skills into practice in a world where a woman's place was still mainly in the home salons were a good bet for those who wanted their own business what modern customers will make of it remains to be seen and what hairstyle would you like today um for a pixie sort of fluffy cut jill embraces management mode while naomi deals with cuts she'll do styling okay yep what sort of thing were you after today a beehive i think fantastic so i'm gonna look really glamorous going to work this afternoon now you're going to work this afternoon with a beehive yes amazing it seems that the nostalgia pull is working wonders for at least two of shepton's ladies i'll say the back mother oh i wanted to keep like this nice really it's really good well done i've been feeling down lately and to go in there and have this done if this lifted my spirits right up i feel brilliant it's just they've changed me completely we've just made ten quid in tips you've only had two customers that's amazing well done girl [Music] the milk bar has attracted another set of customers who want to relive their youth a group of mods by 1960 national service had been abolished and young men found new ways to forge allegiances by joining gangs i love it absolutely love it it's just gobsmacking really uh authentic isn't it fantastic it's exactly as i remember it we were 17 year old boys that's our mum's look except i think yours had a moustache didn't it it's another reminder that the milk bars customers have seen better days you're not allowed smoking there are you we should be in the 60s get in there you have no crush helmet have a cigarette life is a little bit better i think [Music] over at the general store they're doing a roaring trade with michael pulling out all the stops are you looking for a prize out of our cabinet i am i think you might need to buy a little bit more for that to make me spend all my money in here aren't you well if you want a prize you've got to pay the price you see oh i want the radio well if you buy lots of us but you can have it i wish i'd known that before because i've just done virtually a week's shopping in the other shop i think they do refunds [Applause] and customers are making the most of their delivery service what's the challenge for delivery it's free it's free do you want that now and everything's delivered or would you want it all delivered together so that would be nice actually do it for free would you like it now or delivered i'll have that one delivered special present thank you so much bye bye at the grocers carl's got a new idea to try and win over the customers oh wow we got faster i wonder if i could interest you in my new continental range oh right it's exciting exotic some of these things you might have seen in the movies you know pasta and olives and garlic and olive oil and also some cream some bacon some mushrooms some matcha lots some garlic along with a pasta and a bit of cheese and you can make your own creamy mushroom sauce is it quite expensive because it's all new stuff we're doing the whole deal for 6.50 um i think for old time's sake i might take a bottle of the county too actually though the grocer's new products have sparked some interest the sharp's traditional services still seem to be winning the day but the chamber of commerce is in town and they have news that will change the high street forever you know up to now prices have been fixed shops have had no choice about what they charge for their goods 1964 largely result of pressure from the big supermarket owners resale price maintenance was abolished this change in the law meant larger stores like carl's could now set their own prices as they had the space to bulk by it's good news for the surgesons you could charge whatever you like for your goods you could cut prices and we're going to allow you to cut prices up to 20 percent across the range if you want to how do you feel about that over the moon over the moon i'm really impressed about that that's that gives me the edge straight away and i can i can really push it out there and get the loud hair out and make sure the whole town knows and obviously we can just crush the opposition now they can't compete they might have a few loyal customers that may be wealthy enough to pay higher prices but in the long run i think everybody will just see sense and go cheap is better same product 20 less can't go wrong tom explains the impact to andrew and michael i'm afraid i've got some bad news to dish out to and that's in the middle of the era the resale price maintenance was abolished and that meant that self-service shops with their lower overheads could slash their prices and that's what the surgicals are going to do and people like you with shops like this wouldn't have been able to afford to you're going to have to keep them the same if not put them up then surgicans they get bloody everything they've got conveyor belt they get tele in the flat they get to drop the prices get more produce they get everything carl wastes no time acting on the advantage that history has given him by advertising price cuts we've decided to discount the entire store 20 20 yes how about your competitor across the road unfortunately poor mr sharp is not in the same financial position as myself he can't afford to do it yeah he's delivering some food to me after me i don't know if i can cancel well you possibly could i could supply you with goods 20 cheaper i think the fact that there is a sale here is very important um this will make a big difference to the general straw which will find it much more difficult to keep going if the general store can't compete with this crisis they it will go and as we know from experience having lived here over 20 years that's exactly what happened it gives competition a proper edge before we were just different shops of different names selling the foods at the same price now if you manage your products properly and sell them correctly you'll not want your own you'll make a profit but also you'll um lure all the customers away from everybody else especially the general store across the marketplace so i think um the battle lines are drawn now we just have to commence battle [Music] but andrew and michael aren't giving up without a fight as in the 1960s their customers are used to home deliveries you don't know where we drive i know [Music] for small shops running a free delivery service was an added expense but in the face of competition it was worth doing anything to keep customers on side [Music] at the milk bar the customers are getting even older we've got a lot of older people coming in and that is absolutely great i think where we need to be however is the older teenagers and we need to get out there and attract the teenage group that we're meant to be catering for the devlin's potential clientele are on their doorstep but they aren't showing any interest in the milk bar nigel and the boys are on the hunt for teens but they are as retro as their shop so how do you think we're gonna do then dad well if you don't get beaten up for being uh so square um i think we could do all right see my plan is to you know get the girls to follow us and then the boys should follow the girls yeah [Music] first stop is the nearby skate park and nigel takes it upon himself to lead the sales pitch we've recreated a 60s milk bar but the only people are coming in to see us are old people like me actually that's not what we want because at the time milk bars are all for teenagers what we'd like you to do is come and see us it'll be an experience for you um we've got a jukebox there it's a nice place to hang out we think even if you don't hang around even if you just come in have a look and have something to eat that'll be great yeah all right even nigel's teens aren't particularly impressed with his pattern dad's use of words um when addressing kids our age is yeah it's a yeah groovy he said the word hip which let it down a little bit because his um his teenager language is a bit dated at the salon however everyone is happy to be stuck in the past you know i am so thrilled with that it just looks so amazing in the 1960s such elaborate hairstyles necessitated a weekly trip to the salon and customers are finding there's more to this shop than just retro hair the rest of the bottle there there's a lovely girly atmosphere in here jill's providing the women of the town with a place to socialize it's been really really fun loads of fun um challenging learning a new trade but not as bad as i thought it would be i think we've done all right we've had loads of um happy ladies walking around with their glamorous 60s hairstyles so that's brilliant and they're not the only cuts going down well with the customers lower prices mean the sergersons are cashing in [Applause] i was quite surprised i think it was less than five pounds so i can put that in my piggy bank and save for a rainy day even the general stores most loyal customers are being tempted my full weekly shopping i think now she swayed me it'd have to be in here with the price cuts if you would have actually bought this the general store probably would have cost you about four pounds i don't like to give up the general store altogether but on the whole i think i shall be going to the self-service store have you been over to the general store yet no it's closed unfortunately so not but hopefully you'll not go over there well they're closed you're open and i've got what i need thank you we've probably done 100 pounds from after lunch and the general stores close because they think they've got one up on us by offering this personal delivery service but you know they've lost out because they could be taking money and they're not so we're raking it in so silly boy sharpie not only are the sharps losing money and customers to the surgeons but deliveries are looking doubtful thanks to their 50 year old delivery van we've got a bit of a technical difficulty it's boiling its head off about a little thing there'll be no deliveries tonight that's fish away milk will be off some of the stuff will need throwing out so not only do you pee off your customers you throw a product away lose money go get their hand repaired need i say more [Music] it's been a long frustrating day for andrew but sixties life is treating his rivals just fine chinchin god bless thanks [Music] andrew and michael are waking up to the fact that their business is barely viable as you can see the enthusiasm is absolutely unbounded they know they have to make amends for yesterday's failed deliveries yeah i'm just having to redo the stuff we had to throw away last night which is great isn't it not only did the van break down but we uh all the produce went off as well so replace it not only have they lost money but they're in danger of losing customers the master pin we're sorry about the deliveries but somebody killed the van we got halfway to the first customer um and then well i've got no milk i've got no bread i've got all sorts that needs to right okay eggs toilet roll and then a little bit of um compensation a few more green shield stamps to apologize for the break that's all right thank you very much thank you mate cheers say bye bye bye bye i don't think we lost a customer there to be honest no seemed happy enough as happy as someone who's been let down could be quite understanding the one selling point which is the good personal service and the deliveries went off they can't deliver on that then there's just no point going in there at all really i could have just picked it all up from the groceries and be done with it there we are jack and rafe are determined to remedy the lack of teenagers at the milk bar this time without their dad hey guys uh we're doing uh an offer up at the milk bar we've got sort of milkshakes which are chocolate strawberry vanilla wow me and rafe took us 10 seconds and they're already up there loads of girls put on the devlin charm straight up up to the milk bar getting results in favors vanilla strawberry one chilling one day i'm getting i'm getting so what can i get for you guys then uh strong milkshake as well [Music] devlin charm and cut price milkshakes have finally enticed the first group of teen customers into the milk bar nigel and caroline finally have the clientele that their shop was designed for teenagers has some needs somewhere to go somewhere to feel comfortable answering whether they can sit and talk and chat and listen to music but unfortunately and nowadays there seems to be less and less places for them to go what was quite interesting is once they found out that this actually wasn't for all the people that had been coming in at the beginning of the week that was also amazing i actually said to them it's for you guys and they were like what let notes for you and the minute they were told it was for them they all came awesome best milkshake ever amazing oh yeah i think there's seven all the time i think it should be their time then they have my custom the only bad thing about this place is that it's just open for a week white saffron goodness gracious with the business doing so well half day closing means the surgicans aren't just shutting up shop they're taking a holiday oh wow this is lovely grocery shop the clothes are going on holiday this is amazing [Music] [Laughter] just like the upwardly mobile 1960s middle class carl's taking his family on the road britain wanted to explore the great outdoors and the craze for caravanning and camper vans allowed for a spot of camping with all the home comforts not even a spot of rain dampens the surges and spirits [Music] if you didn't rain it would be camping with it we can afford to have a break it's because we've become the king of the high street now we're on the up and unfortunately as sad as it may seem the general source on the way down that's business that's life and looks like the self-service grocer's gonna win the day there you go gotta be happy about it i'm the self-selfish grosser so i gotta be happy about it but back in shepton andrew isn't giving up yet surgicans have got an advantage over us so we're going to take that advantage away we're going to beat them at their own game by taking our product to the customer convenience store on your doorstep even by the late 60s only half of britain owned a car and as andrew knows they were notoriously unreliable so customers still appreciated the door-to-door salesman good afternoon good afternoon could we interest you in some various items we have chocolate bars 50 pence a bar how about a mechanical tea strainer no thanks bake like egg cups and we have four candles or four candles depends how much summerset you speak we have no heather and no curses this is a brilliant scrubbing bush really you won't find that anywhere else lovely salt and pepper pot nice and stylish how much is that going for how much is that going for i had a fiver for the pair five for a pair see all right don't worry i think they're four pounds that's deer but for you because you're a special customer the two pound that's two pounds for that please okay two pounds door-to-door selling may have provided a decent living in the 60s but in 2010 it's a lot of effort for very little gain well that won't pay the diesel will it if we did this regularly i think you could potentially make a bit of a living but it wouldn't be very easy right now we've made about a tenner just under a tenner and um that would barely appear for your petrol to add to their problems they are having yet more car trouble same crap different day i think that's called while andrew's struggling the devlin's determination to engage shepton's youth is paying off nigel and caroline are pushing out all the stops to make them feel welcome i think for everything we hear our teenagers today put them in the right situation and they can enjoy themselves and have a good time with everyone else these kids are out there and they're good kids really good kid for 90 years the devlins have been at the heart of this community they may have lost their bakery but they've succeeded in providing an essential service for a short time at least this town's teams have somewhere to go all along throughout the project our our real concern is being that we're only switching on certain parts of shepherd knowledge and the fact is this week has been a huge huge satisfaction for us hasn't it in terms of seeing what we've just seen [Music] tomorrow is the last day of 1960s trading and while the surgicans are celebrating to our campervan experience yes rock on six days andrew has had enough this is the worst way for a quality butcher to end up selling a bit of monkey coop meat and spam maybe if it's all you knew it might not be so bad but um having had a successful butchery and then been dumped into this it's it's it's it's all destroying it's the shopkeeper's final day on the 60s high street it's been an era of huge change some shops have faltered and others have thrived in just one week jill has gone from dressmaker to running a hairdresser but she's yet to actually cut someone's hair i do feel less apprehensive now than i did to start with but i'm still terrified that some poor soul's gonna come along and expect miracles from me and i am after all only a dressmaker but one of the locals who has used jill as a dressmaker in past eras is about to show how far customer loyalty can go i've opted for a very drastic change i'm going to have my hair cut quite short jill did such a good job with mending my coat i think she'll do just as good a job with my hair are you sure yeah definitely want to do it yeah go on the quicker the bathroom i'd say oh my god there's no going back now well then there's your hair wow there you go that's the major bit done cool [Music] one two three [Music] that's really good thank you very much i've got to go and play with my husband i really like it it is really drastic but um jill did really well to cut my hair it was scary that was for a first haircut to do something that severe but i think she looked really fantastic so successful brilliantly i'm so proud look at mommy do you still love me looking like this not everyone's impressed with you jacob i hate it i think i'm a bit scared i was scared it might be a bit too much for drastic change [Music] while dressmaker jill has managed to adapt to the 1960s the sharps have decided to call it a day let's go down fighting let's get everything sold we want to try and leave nothing nothing at all [Music] michael is laying the blame for the loss of his trade on the grocers well the deal is we've been put out of business by the surgeons and um we're gonna after clothes we're just gonna have to flog everything cheap lovely place mats they're not that fresh for the kids very useful sold to the lady in the corner there well this butter dish we can throw in for a quit everything muscle even us everything must go yeah even us in the end it's the lowest prices that determine where customers shop when the storm clouds come i see you buying lots of stuff here now mr lake yes um economics is with four children i have to look at money more than anything else well i should have seen today the general stores closing down yes i know i'm not surprised i mean ever since they stopped saying the fresh meat when they were butcher shop i've not been so inclined to go in there anyway because you've got everything over here and more and it's cheaper and i can just take it when i want it general stores closed down today it's very sad it is awfully sad it's good for business is it i suppose people it's good for me but it's not good for a general store give it a shot you are changing the whole community here and taking the whole heart out of it and now we have a dead high street and why you've been able to have so many empty shops is because of this i hope you can sleep at night that's all i can say in the 21st century carl runs a small high street deli so he's not unaffected by the sharp's fate i mean it was the real 60s and i was a supermarket i'd be able to moon i've done what i had to achieve but personally uh it's not right we're not only i've made a good mate of him but he's um he's gone it's a shame now i'm a bit upset yes it's very rare that i'm lost words and i am [Music] this town is about to lose another family of shopkeepers whilst the milk bar's been a hit the devlin's hearts just aren't in it anymore pick them up come on this is not what we do this is this is fun but this is this is not our life our job is really done here we're bread makers that's what we do in life that's what we like doing and the real disappointment is moving away from an essential provision like bread to something that's much more superficial i loved your bread i really didn't and you worked so hard and i really appreciated it really and it would be sad to see you go i'm going to be in the room oh thank you michael oh for all the happy hours we've had the best thing for me in the whole experience is a bond we've created with everybody and a lot of people said they're going to miss us the most which is really nice to hear so leaving them behind and leaving chet's mullet behind isn't going to be nice at all you were voted my favorite show if you could have one on me oh thank you very much the transition from victorian to 2010 has been a sad journey that really we didn't necessarily need to take and it really is a start lesson and a realization that we've lost such a lot i remember you always thanks really sad i mean it's been a wonderful experience we really do need our butcher on the high street someone we know someone we can trust someone with whom you built up a relationship just having had that to be lovely and it just teaches me you know it shows me what i'm missing okay when people can't afford to stay in business we lose them and i think it's only after we've lost them we realize what we've lost and then regret it it has been a very very emotional rollercoaster worth now that we've lived it i have a real sense of how it must have been for the people whose lives were turned upside down with emotions running high the chamber of commerce have arrived to assess the impact the 1960s high street has had on the town in this era as the shopper what have you gained and what have you lost i've gained more choice and more convenience but i have lost well some people i've really got to know and care about i'm realizing how shopping has changed loyalty and feelings for people you have to put them aside and it's all what you can get for the least amount of money all the customers i talk to have already started to feel the loss of the social center that's been their high street over these last few weeks and everybody thinks it's the fault of the big business nobody blames themselves even though we're watching them turn their backs on andrew and michael and go towards the convenience stores nobody is saying i'm doing it my mum did it what can we do everybody's looking for for a scapegoat other than themselves it's been a bit of a bitter sweet week for the bakers hasn't it because they've not been able to bring any of their skills to bear but they've had their busiest week yet jill probably had the biggest challenge because her skill is a dressmaker and we asked her to run her hairdressers and are beauticians nothing could have prepared me for the fact that i was going to have a whole different career in a hairdressing family so to be honest if i came back and ended up being a car mechanic i would wouldn't be that surprised i never thought that andrew and his boy michael would be very happy in taking over a sort of general store but they made a pretty good fist of it as well as anybody could exactly despite the range of stuff that andrew and michael were selling in the end it was price and convenience and that's what mattered to people more than the loyalty we gave the surgesons a self-service store and just like in all other areas it seemed a fantastic opportunity to make as much profit as possible and crush the competition i think cole's actually upset that the success of his self-service store has actually brought about the decline and the exit of andrew and michael who he's made friends with well it's the end of the 1960s andrew michael and what we saw happen to your shop was exactly what was happening to the high street back then in the 1960s for me you are the epitome of what we need back in our high streets back in our shopping experience it really has touched us that the depth of feeling that these customers have showed us is is unbelievable if i had out and would take it off to you and and big bow of nothing but utmost respect devlin's real success in your milk bar but of course you're bakers and it's not baking and that's obvious that that's really where your heart is this area like every other era you've just worked your absolute socks off and as a family unit it's it's quite incredible families are absolutely essential in any operation to do the high street i now appreciate how hard my parents actually work to make a living we're all closer now as a family and even more tightly knit than we were before i think with you goes the community spirit i think you've been the epitome of that spirit and with you goes the heart of our high street really sad to see you go absolute pleasure to have me the butcher the baker the counselling maker we've all gone we've disappeared that must be catastrophic for the actual high street it must be catastrophic for local people as well we've had lots of people coming saying we must support our local shops now and that's what this is about it's got the locals are shipped to mullet interested in their high street and in their local shops so taking part in this experiment has actually reinforced my views that it can be really fulfilling to be in a community of people providing a service and a product that people really really want [Music] one typical british town its high street was once its heart and soul not anymore but what if we could turn back time to the days of the butcher the baker and the candlestick maker a group of shopkeepers and their families have left the 21st century behind you are going to discover what the high street was really like your aim is to make this town fall in love with this high street again today's mantra is sell sell sell each week they're living and trading through a different era from victorian to edwardian rabbits pheasants through peacetime and wartime the swinging 60s to the shocking 70s [Music] 100 years of high street history absolutely magical can they sell the products of the past to 21st century customers oh the poor creatures i'd be frightened to give this to the birds and can they make a profit while they're at it this is unbelievably hard i don't know how these poor buggers did this in the old days if i'm really being honest i hate it [Applause] this time the high street reaches the 1970s it's an era of fast-moving fashions and simmering tensions you can't get more than me it was horrible but as the high street concludes its incredible journey i feel like i've been in a time machine will anyone still love it hey boys you're interested in some [Music] chicken for the last time these 21st century shopkeepers have been kitted out for an earlier era [Music] they're now heading into the 1970s the era when chains and malls started taking over our towns from this decade on traditional local shops really struggled to survive so the shopkeepers must cope with big changes as they return to the heart of shepton mallett in somerset their high street's now been trading since the 1870s and throughout the sergis and family have been the grocers for most of that time they've shared the square with the family butchers but in the 1960s the sharps were put out of business [Music] now a new family are coming to take over the site the sanders will be running it as a convenience store in the 70s i was running my dad's store it's gonna be fun i just can't wait exciting it'd be great for the kids to see this area this is definitely not what i usually wear i think it's pretty cool another high street store has changed use in every era from penny bazaar to toy shop most recently it was a hair salon [Music] for the 70s it's a record shop coming to run it is david lashmar who used to own europe's largest second-hand vinyl store it's gonna be quite a challenge actually because some of the people i'm talking to won't even know what an lp is dressmaker jill cockwell has been on the high street since the start of the 20th century but she really has her work cut out this time my honest view about 1970s fashion is that it's horrific um i was always gonna struggle with this era hello ensuring the traders stay true to the era will be the chamber of commerce historian juliet gardner baker tom herbert and green grocer greg wallace welcome to the 1970s now the decade kicked off with great optimism but there are turbulent times ahead so it's really important that you give your customers the full 1970s treatment this is the end of our experiment to see if history can give us any clues as to the future survival of our high streets feedback at the end of this era is crucial we need to know what it is your customers want from their high street good luck go and see your shops debbie harry and saffron began trading six weeks ago as victorian grocers [Music] just like another family from the era 100 years down the line they find themselves running a fully fledged supermarket [Music] it's quite catchy sergio stove yep that's got a good rhyme to actually hasn't it how's that right so did you say the counter goes the 70s was when supermarkets as we know them today conquered britain oh my god cheese ravioli vesta curry man come back from the pub we've had a couple all in a bag normally okay love it love it love it maybe we've got any milk this is a drink i was allowed on christmas day i saw suffer my goodness me 70s processed foods promised to make life easier and 70s supermarkets promised to make shopping quicker now their premises are even larger they've got their wire trolleys they've just got everything that makes it convenient and easy to shop well i'm not convinced by it it seems to be the sterilized kind of shopping that we know now and that's not what the surgises have been up to now it's certainly very different from the small specialist delhi the family run in their 21st century lives what we're doing nowadays in the real world to try and get people away from supermarkets and here i am running a bloody most supermarkets in the 70s only opened between nine and five monday to saturday by law only small stores selling essentials were allowed to open in the evenings or on sundays which is how the sanders hoped to compete with the surgicals [Music] without the scale or technology of a supermarket every job in a typical corner shop was done by the family and usually by hand oh my god i didn't even realize everything from here to in there yeah you gotta stock it all up josh are you the lucky one 12 year old josh and 16 year old karina aren't used to shop work but their dad definitely is in their 21st century lives the sanders owned an award-winning convenience store in the midlands sunder's father bought a shop after coming here from india he said to look there's some to support because you've been the eldest son in the asian community it's your job now to run the store sunder built the business from a single shop into a chain of five stores 26 years of graft have meant his children enjoy a more privileged life i don't think the kids do have any idea what it was like for my parents when they came up because it was really tough i think i could run the shop like if i really if i had to do it but obviously i don't have to do it the children now got to realise sort of they're going to help dad you've got to work hard at their age this is what i did go go go no no just be watching tv or something don't chocolates go up then these sweets go down there i think this is going to be the hardest bet getting it all ready she had to actually price everything pile on everything i'm going to be here all night in the 21st century sunder wouldn't be doing this either these days he employs staff to look after the shop floor it's hard work but we're going to try our best and do our best and be different they're going to have to work hard though aren't they i mean long hours they've really got to make sure that they sell all the little things that people really want and they can't get at the supermarket a good corner shop can be a centre of community just like a pub used to be it really can be it's the way you when you bump into your neighbours where you chat it can be i let's hope it is i'm going super speeding you need to go quick the sanders are offering products which still sell well 40 years later but the same can't be said for every store on the high street oh look it's my shop good lord god oh how brilliant is that a real record shot again fantastic 1970s britain boasted five and a half thousand record shops there were also some 2000 independent stores like the one david ran for three decades until it was forced out of business two years ago when the shop was really running at its full it was so busy we had over 20 people working here it was packed all the time in fact we used to have a chat on the door on saturdays to stop too many people coming in now how about that it's a place that kids would hang out you'd find bands that were getting together it was almost a community place i'm never happier standing behind a counter oh smells records too snails are vinyl i just don't know how david and his record shop's gonna work i mean there's only 270 record shops left in the country there would have been two on every high street great album it's not just going to be about the records that he sells and things it's going to be about the way that he engages with his customers and he's got to make them want to come to his shop and talk to him about vinyl and really see music in a sort of different light starting to look like a proper record shot i think he'll make a big success but if they buy a record they've got to have something to play it on and they don't exist anymore it's like trying to have a blacksmith in here trying to sell you a horseshoe for your car it's not gonna work record stores weren't the only places selling youth culture on the 70s high street fast-moving fashion was now big business which means there's a new street level store for dressmaker jill it's so not what i was expecting is loads posture it's like a proper stylish boutique and i was expecting a cheap shot full of loads of cheap 9 on clothes so this is fantastic what jill has got to do is keep up with changing fashion i mean they change totally went from cat suits right through to punk but she is not the girl with the biggest entrepreneurial spirit she's never ever ever taken any money now i've seen the shop and the stock that i've got available and the fabric i've got available i think i might have a chance of actually making some money this week at surgersave carl wants to thrill shepton's shoppers with an official opening but back in the 70s a new store could bring the whole town out onto the streets the big chains laid on the razamataz booking the biggest stars to do the honours it's publicity dying creating a sense of excitement in present day shepton mallet may prove more of a struggle when this is not working it's really annoying me [Music] whose idea was just to use the trolley anyway ladies and gentlemen can you please gather round come along come on closer the surgicals have got david from the record shop don't cut it yet just look towards me and smile it's not being a crowd didn't they yeah too big yeah three two one cut it [Applause] right come on [Music] reviving a supermarket competition from the era the winner is [Applause] trolley dashes were a standard store opening stunt long before dale winton made a game show out of them sainsbury's called theirs grub grabs [Music] great supermarket sweep got all the public to know that we're here we've got some good hits in the press perfect good night more the corner shop hasn't the budget for a glamorous launch doors wide open [Music] i don't think anybody knows where you've been luckily some of shepton's residents have promised to shop only in the 1970s high street hello sir how are you and when they eventually trickle in they find some products that sergio save doesn't stock it's one of the same days in two years really we love curry's all the indian spices and things over here we haven't got a clue what to do with it yeah if you have a chat with pam she'll go through and tell you how to make it i'll write it down for you i'll give you the basics and then you should be all right okay wonderful okay the corner shop was one of the places 70s britain got to know more about asian cultures sometimes shopkeeping was the only work available even for highly qualified immigrants record shop owner david has gone glam for his grand opening [Music] his store is quickly full of browsers but to turn them into customers he has some major hurdles to overcome long-playing records cost over 20 pounds each in today's money and younger customers have to be taught what to do with them flip over the biscuit as they say drop it on the spindle if you just bring that down gently [Music] like all good record shops of the time david is offering his customers the chance to try before they buy you should have something there [Music] you can make as much noise as you like you're in a record shop it's good all right you sing along with me [Music] oh this is brilliant it is it's a live track really good i mean that's how we used to sell these it's not going past the scanner and somebody going you actually got the chance to listen to them you talk to me about it saying oh i don't like that i'll try something else that was what buying records was all about customers in the 70s didn't just get vinyl from their local record shop many of them got a musical education there too johnny the fox a very powerful rock i'm really nice check that out when you come back and see us tomorrow tell me whether you liked it if you did we can move in that direction if not we'll choose something else rob you're going to take that original copy of pink floyd darts on the moon when your folks go out turn it up and fill the room with noise and you tell me how much better that sounds oh yes david's enthusiasm is infectious though to seal the deal he does have to throw in a little something extra you got that okay oh yeah not too bad susie you're gonna enjoy because jill has struggled to make any money from fashion in previous eras the chamber of commerce are sending in some expert advice lee bender knows all about making a business out of a boutique hi i'm jill it's lovely to meet you nice to meet you lee was the founder of one of the most successful boutiques of the seventies bus stop we had our first one in uh kensington everyone used to queue up in the mornings to get in wait you had queues of people outside your shops oh how wonderful you must have been doing something right then yeah it was the first of its kind really my public were young and so they were really interested in new ideas and new materials and new colors and and the new music and the whole thing went hand in hand needed to look the part so jill slips into the first 70s style she'll be selling glam rock you'd wear that now practically i'm not sure i would wear it would you not i don't know what boutiques like lee's sold not just single items of clothes but a whole look so jill needs to provide accessories and also advice on which garments go together yeah that is very shiny yes so if you had a third piece then that would be really good that was silvery no that doesn't work [Music] customers can now put their 1970s style supermarket to the test [Music] it was so much nicer when you were serving us behind a country and it wasn't it was really enjoyed but we have to go all the way around the shop before we get to you [Music] by the 70s supermarkets had turned shopkeeping into a science as a result life for the surgicans is easier than it's ever been during their whole century of shop work however efficiency comes at a cost you know the fact now that i'm a supermarket manager i'm stuck in the office we've lost the interactiveness with the customers so do it yourself and it's and they come out to me on the odd price you've missed and that's the only interaction we get but do the customers care if they talk less with staff having experienced previous eras of personal service in the grocers do they miss it i didn't like it at all really because you just get none of the service that you used to get and i don't know it's just going around and sort of it's all impersonal there was everything there i wanted i suppose there was everything and it was easy it was easy shopping but just not so friendly my experience in that shop is it's dead and it's cold there's no life and there's no feeling i like the old mr sargeant he was always there to help wasn't him anyway he unfortunately he's gone the 1970s mr surgison is too busy with his managerial duties which now include distributing payroll laws on equal pay for women were only enforced from the mid-seventies are you that outraged that you get paid left yes i am outraged unfortunately it is hardly anything else to be fair you have just sat on the table that's the law ladies and gentlemen because there's no price structure there's no wage structure at the moment it's women get paid what we feel they're worth okay so who's better you're going to be sleeping tonight [Music] the typical 1970s high street shut up shop at 5 p.m with one notable exception the other shops have closed now all of them have closed can't we just well you can't can you close early what did you say this morning you're not going to get bored i'm not bored i'm tired get used to it then the 70s convenience store would make most of its money when the supermarket was shut yeah just just that yeah name and the dress would be good it also offered services other shops had abandoned i understand you do deliveries we do deliveries and newspaper rounds we're here for the customers customer demand we're there you know that's what i love about the asians yeah it's all about service is the one thing that i noticed when i first gave this country was the lack of service and i came in the 80s do you know it's just the whole personal touch thing you just can't get that with the big stores now it's not turning no no there's no time it's just i'll be a little bit over the top for that kind of service rather than go to my local supermarket i would be a little bit extra to get what i want above shepton's new supermarket the surgicans can spend their evening relaxing at home after a profitable first day's trading [Applause] we made a lot of money because a lot of people came in which was good people weren't just buying daily shops they were buying weekly shops so that more money was going through the till a lot quicker which was really good to compete with a supermarket small businesses have to work harder boys bye bye they also have to work longer sunder finishes a 14-hour shift at nine in the evening the first day i'm so tired but this is like going back in time and it was tough it did made me think about how my dad had to work when he was younger because it was a lot of hard work i don't know how he did it every day reliving his youth also reminds sunder of some of his father's old money-making schemes dad he was very clever because he got mopped to make onion bhajis and samosas again the locals love that it's a pity i could have done that today but maybe tomorrow [Music] the next morning and the man who was working latest is up earliest [Music] well wanna wake up matey yeah you just say that you gotta get up for six o'clock i'm gonna do a paper round yeah okay yeah good boy the convenience store opens two hours before their rivals at the supermarket you got one extra there another competitive advantage for the sanders is cheap labor later this is legendary no unions to worry about when you keep business in the family in the 21st century many news agents no longer offer paper deliveries because they can't pay enough to persuade modern kids to do them my dad paid me less than five for my work today i would probably never do it again as it's such a hard job [Music] josh is going to be paid the going rate for a paper boy in the early 70s that's just one pound in today's money yeah you should be grateful you're getting 15 pence because we had we got nothing whatsoever what we have to do is work all day at the till and it's we just have to do it if you want to buy some sweets with that you can buy them here and see what you can get really not fair not at all literally that is hard doing that very hard [Music] at david's shop customers are returning with feedback there's something really satisfying about having the music in your hands rather than in a sort of computer file or whatever compared with the the the cds that you get today in the downloads from the internet it was disappointing i'd forgotten all their difficulties with vinyl that there was with the jumping and the scratching we put up with that during the 60s and 70s and i said yeah i don't know how we put up with it i don't think i could go back and go back to it yeah and i've lost two customers there was only one alternative to vinyl which a 70s record shop could offer it could be charlie animals you certainly can that'll bring back a lot better just have to bear with me this is slow 1970s shopping i gotta rewind it now no i don't care for that could you put it onto the next track no you can't it's a cassette oh the other trend setter on the high street also has out-of-date stock to shift but at least she can pass it off as vintage it's great there's a mirror right here what's your size ie five six as advised she's not just trading in frocks she's pushing accessories too [Music] thank you for the first time jill is selling stock she didn't make herself when mass-produced clothing first appeared on the 1930s high street jill preferred to stick with bespoke dressmaking i'm not really a salesperson just about selling for the money it was time-consuming and not very profitable the beauty of a boutique however is she can still make use of her dressmaking skills when she chooses i've actually brought some things in i was wondering whether we could sort of vamp them up a little bit great jacket i think it's absolutely seen better days oh i've got great ideas for this already we could whip this collar off and then i could do a bigger collar in the leopard print jill also remodelled clothes in the make do and mend years of wartime she seems to be drawing on everything she's learned in previous eras whether she's also learned how to make money the customers will decide it's just fantastic to have a boutique like this in chapter merit my goodness me the one thing we haven't got is clothes shopping as this would be heavenly something that would draw people from miles around be wonderful we had a really good time in there and that was like mine and zoe's heaven or idea of heaven this could be a contender for my favorite shop in all of the eras [Music] in their home above the corner shop pam and karina still can't escape from work hello mr gusty i've got mud on my hand they're making something the teenage sunder used to sell in his father's shop don't know how hot they are so i'm gonna put two samosas um that smells disgusting i hate the smell about stuff it's probably at least i feel sick i feel like an indian granny a proper indian granny i don't really like indian food you like the chicken curry i like you can carry out steps don't like the taste of it or the cooking's not the only culture shock karina's experiencing after two days in the 70s i miss my clothes i miss my phone i miss my friends i miss my bed i miss i miss everything everybody easy nowadays haven't you yeah but you didn't know any better though but then because you because there wasn't there wasn't blackberries out there there wasn't iphones out in the center so you didn't know yeah but we didn't we lived without it didn't we oh no but you didn't know any better though downstairs the other half of the family start selling the samosas my wife actually made them yeah sort of let me know what they taste like i love it i can taste the cumin so she says i'm making myself they go oh we'll have a few so it's been different i think it's it's definitely taken off but while the sanders sell fresh homemade produce their rivals are pushing the opposite i've got some little ideas here so maybe make life easier when you've had day at work burgers pizzas ice cream fish fingers at the start of the 70s just three percent of british households owned a freezer but by 1980 half the country did frozen food became big business especially flown in from italy just for you we've got lasagna it's basically exotic oh yes shoppers who would once have bought fresh meat from their high street butcher now bought it frozen instead to boost sales of chicken which rocketed in popularity during the cost-conscious seventies the surgicans embark on another pr stunt the 70s was the last era when supermarkets would serve up showmanship with the shopping the surgicans first learned the art as victorian grocers i'm selling the world's largest cheddar [Music] oh just like instead of being mass produced yeah definitely pumped them out by the millions so chances are no i thought [Music] now the novelty has worn off david's shop is struggling to attract customers he too needs to come up with a promotional gimmick a guaranteed crowd puller for record shops was a personal appearance by a famous band scenes like this brought glamour to the high street as well as big sales for the shop so david is trying to book a star from the era my name's david and i'm running a 1970s record shop in shepton mallet and i'm really phoning to see if it's possible that david bowie might be to come down and do an opening for us um i wonder if i should just bypass queen for the moment and go go for the who i wonder if you'd be good enough to give me a call back my name's david i really look forward to hearing from you bye well you never know [Music] blondie you have to email her agent i have a big problem with emails because we are a 1970s record shop we don't actually have emails or anything like that all i can do is to write a phone they're missing opportunities these people you know as the rejections pile up david sets his sights a bit lower i know you represent to the quo i wonder if there's any availability i'm trying to find a big and important band such as mud just when he's running out of hope we've got a yes brotherhood of man this is absolutely brilliant oh my god the high street has been hit by a 70s style power cut well that's a bit because the fridges are gonna all the food's gonna start yeah so well then frozen chickens will be fresh chickens yeah who's tony lights out how can i have a record shop without any lights without electricity for the surgicans with their extensive range of frozen and chilled food this could be a disaster in the event of the freezer breaking down the priority is to minimize the amount of stock loss by trying to keep steady temperature wrap the freezers in blankets to retain the temperature what about fridges does it say about finishing no it doesn't say anything about fridges it's a minor strike but there's an opportunity to sell the batteries and the torches the ever enterprising corner shop is stocked for just this eventuality you are a lifesaver it's a shame you can't provide a generator for my sewing machine then i could get on with some work not only has the supermarket checkout ground to a halt their products are beginning to thaw our fridge stock won't last very long without refrigeration so we're going to try and get the trolley and try and flock it to people in the streets and cook for the tonight get it gone right so 50 pence for that sweetheart it's going cheap it's cheap cheap you know hey boys you're interested in some chicken legs how about these ones right you want three chickens six quid six squared for three two i'm happy with the price you'd do tesco's out of business you will well that's the idea [Music] when power's restored the next day the chamber of commerce have delivered new stock to jill's boutique i guess punk's in good i don't mind leather that's fine as usual jill takes it on herself to be a trendsetter and models what she sells [Music] [Applause] then she offers a makeover to the other high street retailer who's got to keep his finger on the pulse of fashion come on cross between sid vicious and kendra i'm sid dodd without check but david's first task of the day is publicizing a band not many anarchists were into don't be scared it's only me underneath all this i've got brotherhood of man coming down to the shop the real brothers and men are coming in to sign autographs have you heard of the brotherhood of man they're the number one single save all your kisses for me he knows that a successful record retailer must focus not on what's cool but on what will sell they're actually turning up at my shop this afternoon at five o'clock mars records you had to fight your way through the crowd i think it's going to be a big event this afternoon so far this morning sunder's been working on his own hey josh greener it's ten o'clock time to wake up daddy's been in the shop for over three hours and you're still in bed you're gonna get up the young sanders have had enough i'm not looking forward to getting up working in the shop because it gets monot nurse 10 o'clock it's not it's not good enough you know ideally they should have been here 8 o'clock with me to help me out but sunder has a plan that will force his children to take on more responsibility karina josh can you run the shop for two hours while we're away no she's gone when i was small i stood on the shop this is [Music] by the 70s it was only in small family businesses that a 12 year old like josh would be seen working [Music] first the junior sanders have to master the most basic of shopkeeping skills i think something is two pounds two pound twelve two by fifty one was that yes oh my god i don't have to work the tail yeah that's 377. 377 all together yes right okay josh isn't sure his sister has got her maths right here it's 123. 2 pounds 250 for the jam then two packs of spices we need a calculator hello hello how are you 72 p for the while we found out the person was first [Music] trina do you know what this is oh that's that indian stuff what's it called it's an indian spice i think it's going really well as we've had quite a few customers in but we've served them happily and all of them have been happy so i think it's going really well i wouldn't go into a business if it was like this because it's so like extreme like everything's just hard after two hours the bosses are back did you enjoy it no i didn't enjoy it all i hated it it was horrible the queen got a bit stressed i don't know why there's loads of people in here by the time juliet from the chamber of commerce pays a visit josh and karina already have a fuller understanding of what life was like for their parents in the past but there's one aspect of the seventies which sunder hasn't shared with his children the racism he experienced and at a time when extremists were regularly on the march sunda himself was assaulted i remember one particular one i was sort of going to the shop and a couple of lads were sort of shouting sort of racist names to me and i ignored them and one of them tapped me on my shoulder and i just turned around and he just punched him in the face for no reason and i had another punch in my face and i thought myself why am i getting beated i've done nothing whatsoever i'm not so glad so my kids are not going through that i think hearing your story which is really really very painful and it's a very very shaming story it was it was tough and we're trying to do business at the same time as well there's no point in doing it really when all you're trying to do is make a living and serve yeah exactly very shameful story it really is a very shameful story but hearing that kind of stuff makes you quite upset because like happened to your dad and your granddad so obviously it does hit you quite a bit the kids really don't know any of this you don't really tell them i feel quite glad that i'm living life now and not then but i feel sad for my dad being so shocked and scared waiting for the smash [Music] jill is punking up her punters oh my god that's so cool what's your mum gonna say when she sees you [Music] punk was a movement that valued independent designers like jill and is still a model for how small retailers can put two fingers up at chain store conformity it'd be brilliant for shipping to have shops like this just it would add such creativity to the town i think it'll be really fun do you know what i mean it's you see it in big cities and really cool arty areas and stuff but but not in shepherds in the big cities all the shops are all the same so it's lovely to have something so different in the smaller towns all right thank you very much thank you thank you bye i've got some leather gloves you might like shepton shoppers have now had time to make up their minds about their new supermarket [Music] it's all about sort of get around the store as fast as you can get in the basket get out quick and the supermarket at the end of the day just wants your money the the corner shop that was much much more personal more more enjoyable experience but they didn't have the produce there's not so much selection and they weren't able to pick things up and touch them and pray so easily you get the personal service don't you in the corner shops whereas i always think in a supermarket you're just a number to them more and more britons in the 70s shopped for groceries just once a week thanks to more of us having freezers cars and supermarkets [Music] so it's a sign of sergio save's success that it's become emptier as the week goes [Music] on stuck on here just do [Music] it's all i do all day long so it's pretty boring as when there's no customers it's hard because you just have to sit and just wait for them in all the other areas if you didn't have customers it was a bit of a godsend sometimes because you have a lot of other things to do i am bored beyond belief i'm completely lost we've gone through all the eras we've been de-skilled we don't roast our own coffee anymore we don't make our own butter anymore we don't blend our own tea we do nothing we've gone literally from sacks to packs and it's all downhill as far as i can see yet even though no one has any love for the supermarket people keep using it i mean i miss the little shops you know you do but it's all right it's you get what you want and we're always in a hurry so it's okay [Music] ladies and gentlemen citizens it's time for lashmar records big pr event there hasn't been a crowd this big in the town square since ve day this is not a cover versions band not one member his mate's dog and his auntie this is actually brotherhood [Applause] and you and his promotional campaign finally pays off we had him queuing at the counter for the first time since we opened cueing at the counter waving money and buying so if you do something extra for the customers say this is special there's this community this is where you can hang out and have a laugh they'll flock to your doorstep for david today's been about much more than making money it's actually been quite emotional to me i realize how much i miss it i love trading i love records i love music and i love a relationship with my customers absolutely wonderful and that's something i'm aware how that gradually was eroded so there's a degree of emotion uh and loss it's the last day of trading on the historic high street i just think it's going to be a really sad day today and i know for a fact if i see somebody crying it's just going to stop me off and i hate that i don't want to be crying [Music] by now the young sounders are getting ready for work without too much complaint situated hair tied up prince is not that disgusting all the time no it doesn't suit me and their shop has some new stock it's a nice place the queen's silver jubilee in 1977 wasn't just an opportunity to boost sales of tea towels it also saw street parties being held across britain and shepton mallett's high street is planning to restage these celebrations to mark the end of trading typical british summer big celebrations queen's jubilee and it's tipping with rain sort of it's really sort of put the dampness on everything isn't it it's an understatement yeah it's horrible well should get this down and get this into a hall somewhere and have a bit of bunting in the hall somewhere yeah work quickly begins on relocating the street party away from the street it adds to the stress on an already pressured morning the shopkeepers also need to tot up their final takings the chamber of commerce are back in town to inspect the accounts their first question has jill finally learned to be a businesswoman i've been doubting jill's ability to take any money and i thought 1970s fashion would be virtually impossible mostly closed she's taken nearly 900 quid 897 queen i mean hats off to that lady that's amazing that's really really good i'm absolutely tough to bits with that she's just made it a buzzy place everybody wants in chapter matt wants to hang out here and they really want to keep it however the other shop selling 70s style took less than a quarter of the money made by the boutique there's a need for what jill does in the way that you know david's shop can only ever be a curiosity these days exactly but i mean he has really got people into the high street and he's got that personal service and he's got the expertise but the till doesn't lie 214 quid i think we've gone too far down the road now to persuade people that buying vinyl is a viable option [Music] she's not coming back a bit thing i really like the cds will be gone soon i really like the concept of it but it's not going to happen it's downloading the future my laptop's just a little bigger bigger than a vinyl and it's got about 8 000 more songs on so it's been a little bit more convenient [Music] i've been a museum that sells some of its exhibits and that's all i have been this is not viable as a retail operation [Music] the other new arrivals on the high street worked harder than anyone so have they been rewarded with a profit to take 550 quid near as dammit i think it's a very credible job they made a success of things because they were prepared to work really hard they were prepared to keep open long after the supermarkets they couldn't compete on price but what they could compete on was convenience the most important thing that i've learned is that i can work more hours than i usually can and the family can work better together than alone i think it was a bit of a shock to them they realized how difficult it was for me while i was young helping my dad out we're closer now it's really good but the shop that took the most money was the place no one loves yet everyone uses they take over a thousand pounds again throughout every era the surgeons have proved to me they are a class act if you combine hard work with some basic marketing skills you can make a go of anything anywhere and they've proved it here but for the surgicals themselves it's a hollow victory the 1970s yes what a boring era i don't want to be a big conglomerate that's not what i'm about i'm more of a small businessman and many luck i'll continue doing that i just felt like i lost my personality and all that lovely personal service i'm used to giving kind of died in the 1870s everybody was individual if you had your butcher you always had your baker and then as time's gone on we've lost that now and it's all it's all come to me i do the entire lot history has showed us that the successful grocers have turned into the successful supermarkets today and have killed the high street at the start of the 70s supermarket chains took 44 of all grocery sales in 2010 they take almost 98 in one town however the high street has come back to life at least for the last six weeks now shepton mallett is out in force again for the silver jubilee party joined by some familiar faces andrew sharp and his son michael ran the high streets butchers and the devlin family were the town's bakers from the 1870s until the 1960s when both their trades were taken over by the grocers another casualty of progress was blacksmith simon grant jones across the eras all of them worked tirelessly to draw people back into a previously unloved town center woah look at this look at this everybody's made friends everybody has interacted with each other a lot more not just people with the shopkeepers but people with the other customers the high street has really brought us all together as a community and i don't see why it can't work like that again ladies and gentlemen we wanted to see what we may learn from 100 years of our high street history and clues to perhaps the future of our high streets and i think the biggest thing more than anything else is if you just look along this room is the actual sense of community of getting choked up and chatting to everybody it's most certainly possible that this can continue there's enough brain and heart here to do whatever you want it really is up to you guys it didn't matter what era we set this high street in we had huge successes we always did and that was down to hard work and some marketing if you can bring a little bit of razzmatazz no matter what that is a point of difference into the high street into the shops you will have a success it's proved to me undoubtedly that there is a place for the heist but the future of any high street lies in the hands of its community i think i've just quite simply learned that the high street won't work unless people want it to basically it's up to the customers not the traders about what happens in a high street because there's no customers and there will be no traders whatever the future holds shepton mallet now has to bid farewell to its time-traveling shopkeepers losing touch with you honey that's for sure oh it's been amazing i feel like i've been in the time machine however tough it might now be for local shops to compete with the big chains i know i called you a scotland at least these traders have proved they could offer something extra alongside their rivals there's a place for these big corporations that can provide convenient cheap good quality products and we can get them any time of day or night and anywhere we go that's what consumers want clearly so there's also a place for small unique individual businesses and if you don't support them every high street in the world is going to look identical thanks for everything made it really special this project has absolutely proved that 100 that people love interacting with their shopkeepers hi darling thanks for popping in it's really nice to see you bye what is nice is like to see like a family like yourselves and to get that service from you you don't don't get that today people are important when you're in a business they are you're number one and you've got to look after them because this is where you gain over the supermarkets how do you overcome the competition they do something different from the competition if you ever want to come back and open up a shop please we need shots like this [Music] very emotional i can't believe what we've actually achieved what we've done everything we've gone through but most of all you know we did this for a reason and the reason is to bring our high street back i hope we've achieved what we've set up to do [Music]

Channel: Absolute History

Views: 221,914

Keywords: history documentaries, absolute history, world history, ridiculous history, quirky history, second world war, world war 2, world war two, turn back time, ministry of food

Id: Y1uxncV65b4

Length: 167min 15sec (10035 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 29 2022