After 2 years we finally decided that the Bath shop just wasn’t viable. Once I looked at the figures it wasn’t actually a hard decision to make. If anything it was a relief to make the decision because now we can move on and get Bristol and London on track and make them work harder. It’s a funny thing running an almost social enterprise business (but not). We have ‘grand illusions’ about promoting fair trade and organic non food products, and thereby making a real difference, yet the bottom line ‘profit’ is, at the end of the day, what we have to listen to, or rather is what the bank manger makes us listen to.
We will close the door to customers on the 30th of June and hope to have everything out of there as soon as possible afterwards as we will have to pay rates until the unit is empty. Bath council have a lot to answer for – we will only get 3 months rates free then will have to pay 50% of the rates until we assign the lease. Lets all pray that we assign the lease quickly. Fortunately there are not many empty units on the street at the moment so that is in our favour. Also the shop is well decorated so that will help.
It’s funny that originally we anticipated Bath being a better store than Bristol. In theory Bath is an ideal place for a shop like BORN; Green council policies, affluent people, highest percentage of paid off mortgages in the UK, ABC1 profile of customer, but they just weren’t coming through our doors. The regular customers we had were great, there just weren’t enough of them.
After a year the Stoke Newington shop is doing almost as well as Bristol. With some more networking and promotion I’m sure it will overtake it soon!
Friday, June 09, 2006
Bed sharing with your baby
Could write loads on this, but here are some of the main reasons why I do it.
I remember as a child lying chest to chest on my dad and being lulled to sleep by the rhythm of his breathing. I think I must have been about 4 years old. My parents never turned any of us away from their bed, although I think being the youngest I was in there the most! When dad went to Goa for 2 or 3 weeks as he did every other year, I would always sleep with mum and would listen to her heart beat as I fell asleep with her. I was a lot older then, probably almost a teenager, but it never seemed strange to me at all, because for Asian families sleeping with your flesh and blood isn’t strange. It was only when I was expecting Maya that I encountered people who thought it was odd. I said to them, and take no offence please (my husband is English) “you English people think it’s ok to sleep with your cat or dog after it has been running around in God knows what but you think it’s strange to sleep with your baby!!!” I want my children to know in their soul the unconditional love that I would have felt as a baby because in this messed up world where people are spending a lot of time getting their heads sorting out to deal with childhood issues I feel it’s an investment I’m more than willing to make.
I absolutely believe that in its first years of life it is imperative that a baby is physically grounded by a parent otherwise they will search for that grounding for a long time afterwards.
I remember as a child lying chest to chest on my dad and being lulled to sleep by the rhythm of his breathing. I think I must have been about 4 years old. My parents never turned any of us away from their bed, although I think being the youngest I was in there the most! When dad went to Goa for 2 or 3 weeks as he did every other year, I would always sleep with mum and would listen to her heart beat as I fell asleep with her. I was a lot older then, probably almost a teenager, but it never seemed strange to me at all, because for Asian families sleeping with your flesh and blood isn’t strange. It was only when I was expecting Maya that I encountered people who thought it was odd. I said to them, and take no offence please (my husband is English) “you English people think it’s ok to sleep with your cat or dog after it has been running around in God knows what but you think it’s strange to sleep with your baby!!!” I want my children to know in their soul the unconditional love that I would have felt as a baby because in this messed up world where people are spending a lot of time getting their heads sorting out to deal with childhood issues I feel it’s an investment I’m more than willing to make.
I absolutely believe that in its first years of life it is imperative that a baby is physically grounded by a parent otherwise they will search for that grounding for a long time afterwards.
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