The beginning of March was a challenging time. Snow drops were fully out and the daffodils were on their way – and then came the Beast from the East. The snow and the very low temperatures were a shock. Hopefully you all managed during that period. The shop closed early on the two very snowy days, but staff and volunteers were great and worked hard to keep everything going. Even the papers got through. Luckily we were able to get the use of two 4 wheel drive vehicles, and teams went out into the snow drifts to deliver. This was helped because most people, very sensibly, kept off the road so we encountered very little traffic. Over the two very bad days we failed to deliver to just four houses – not bad given the weather. Needless to say the papers were delivered later than usual; apologies to our customers for that.
We were very pleased to welcome a new permanent member of staff at the beginning of March. Sheila Crawford joined us on 1 March and will be working in the Post Office on Thursdays, Fridays and alternate Saturday mornings. This means that we are now back to a full establishment of staff in the shop and the PO.
Thank you to those PO users who are making regular purchases in the shop when they visit us. We have explained before that the PO is subsidised by our shop takings. That means that for the PO to remain open we need to do well in the shop.
Despite the fact that we have taken on additional paid staff, we are still very dependent upon volunteers. Our existing volunteer team is great but we always need more volunteers on weekdays and at the weekend. We are particularly short of volunteers for our early opening period on Saturdays and Sundays. This entails about 3 hours each day, and we need volunteers to work in the shop and to deliver newspapers using our shop car.
If you can help please ask for a volunteer leaflet in the shop, or email Neil on nrhaynes40@tesco.net or Carol-anne on carol_anne_rhatigan@hotmail.com.
Opening times over Easter are as follows:
- Good Friday 30 March 7.30-10.00am
- Saturday 31 March – normal opening times 6.30am -12.30pm
- Sunday 1 April – normal opening times 7.30 -10.00am
- Easter Monday 2 April – 7.30-10.00am
- Newspapers in the shop and newspaper deliveries will be normal for all of these days