End of the supermarket power

It seems a growing mass of people have lost trust in the supermarkets and would like to see the space changed to a park or allotments?

I spent the last 5 days promoting BigBarn and local food at the Bristol Food Festival and in Oundle (Northants) at the pre-launch of the women’s cycling tour. Everyone I spoke to thought the re-greening of supermarket space was a fantastic idea!

Perhaps not surprising when in Bristol there were riots when Tesco tried to open a new store, and in Oundle, Waitrose had the gall to promote the opening of their new mega store with a stall on the Farmers’ Market.

Last night Oundle streets had been closed for the start of the women’s Tour of Britain and local Green organisations, (like BigBarn), were invited to set up stalls. As usual Waitrose had muscled in so I stood 2 yards from the centre of their stall handing out BigBarn leaflets and saying “Here is a leaflet about how to find local food so you don’t have to go to Waitrose’

Nearly everyone laughed and said ‘well done’. But most had the Waitrose bag full of freebies they had been given. Those that commented about the bag said that they were not going to miss the opportunity of free food and that they would not be shopping at Waitrose.

Not one person responded to my offer of a leaflet with “No thanks I love Waitrose”. Perhaps like me they noted that and all the staff on the Waitrose stand were PR people from London.

After the Horse meat scandal, foot and mouth, and continual news about corporate greed it seems we consumers are now looking for an alternative to the supermarket . People want to source food from places they can trust and probably why butchers and farm shops are seeing a resurgence.

BigBarn is designed to be the catalyst for this resurgence. We have worked hard for 13 years on continually building our database of local producers and retailers to help people find great local food, the story behind the food, and often food that is cheaper than the supermarket.

We are putting together an online ordering system for local food delivered in to Bristol & Bath that will be better than supermarket. (If you has a BS or BA1 postcode register here). Once a success the concept will be duplicated across the rest of the UK.

So, if you want to see change, stop shopping at the supermarkets. Switch to local and tell your friends. You can use our local food map to find your local suppliers and please email [email protected] with any errors or omissions. Every business on our map has a password to add news, events, offers, join crop for the shop, and even video. Please tell them to add more to attract customers, call us, or even offer to help if they are technophobes.

Increased demand for local food will encourage more production and increase agricultural diversity, all helping build a more sustainable food industry.

Buying local will divert a large slice of the £120b spent with supermarkets to local communities with massive social benefits for all, and perhaps get more green space to grow fresh, healthy food.