The National Craft Butchers (NCB) has published a number of positive stories of butchers across the country going above and beyond to feed the nation during the Covid-19 pandemic.
T.J. Sowerby Butchers has installed a service window to the front of its store for a contact-free service.John Mettrick from Mettricks, Glossop told the NCB that they have seen a huge increase in deliveries and have used a local taxi service for help. He said: “We are proud to be doing everything we can to meet demand at this difficult time. Our local & flexible supply lines have been a real advantage.”George Debman a Craft Butcher from Ipswich said: “My staff and I are managing despite only having four or five hours sleep a night. Our customers have been magnificent, often queuing for 30 minutes in the cold but remaining cheerful.” William Lloyd Williams MBE, from Machynlleth in mid Wales said: “I was very proud to receive my MBE from The Queen. After the fortnight butchers have just had I think they will all be recognised for keeping meat on the nations tables and helping to keep a war-time spirit going.”
“In our view the Governments future food policies should do everything to preserve and enhance local food supply chains. As we are seeing this is exactly what is needed in times of crisis.”
Rob Sowerby of T.J. Sowerby Butchers in Stockton on Tees has gone on further by introducing a perspex service window to the front of the store to serve customers.Sowerby said of the idea: “We have created a perspex service window with doorbell and intercom at our shop front with a service hatch and blind at the bottom to pass peoples meat through in carrier bags via a container so we can still serve people who walk up to the shop and so people can collect there phone orders as I don't deliver.”“We take contactless card payments through the perspex or pass the card machine through the service hatch on a chain for chip and pin and then disinfect it afterwards, this has minimised customer contact for us and people contact for our customers and has stopped people coming into to a shop where many have been in already touching door handles and breathing the same air.”Richard Stevenson of the NCB said: “Butchers are incredibly busy and supplying prodigious quantities of quality, sustainable meat to their communities. There is a huge lesson to learn here when things return to normal.“In our view the Governments future food policies should do everything to preserve and enhance local food supply chains. As we are seeing this is exactly what is needed in times of crisis.”
This story was originally published on a previous version of the Meat Management website and so there may be some missing images and formatting issues.
