Stores editor John Ryan works at weekends in his local community shop. Here’s his view from the shelf-edge in Wiltshire

In my village there is a community shop and at weekends I help on Saturdays and Sundays with the opening routine on a voluntary basis.

This means putting the supplements in the papers - from the Mail on Sunday to the Observer - putting stickers on the pre-ordered copies, putting the croissants in the oven and keeping a watch on them, and checking off the orders for the fresh food that has arrived, among other things.

The shop is very reasonably priced, owing to the fact that there are no labour costs and working there is probably more fun than being a shift worker in some c-stores.

The Wren’s Shop, named after Sir Chris, who comes from these parts, has just celebrated its 10th anniversary and is currently closed.

It’s closed owing to the fact that it is midway through a refit and a modest expansion of its storage and office space. In its place there is a Wren’s Shop pop-up store, about 100m along the main drag through East Knoyle.

Most pop-up shops of this kind don’t actually look as good as the thing they are temporarily replacing but, if anything, the Wren Pop-up looks better – mainly because it is housed in a building which uses an inglenook fireplace as the vehicle for a market-style display of fruit and veg.

And even if Neil, the manager for those on the early shift, gently moans that it’s been laid out by a southpaw and this makes things tricky for right-handers like himself, it’s still a good place to be and ringing up the sales on the till usually involves a chat as well.

This is what retail at a local level used to be like – the sort of place where service meant knowing where everything is and actually knowing the names of those who walk through the door – which does make the whole process more personal on both sides of the counter.

The only mild issue is hitting the Fox & Hounds on Friday night and then reporting for duty at 6.45am on Saturday. It’s not always the first thing that you might want to do as the alarm sounds at 06.15 but, on the other hand it’s good to be part of something that many big retailers, and food retailers in particular, are striving to achieve.

Being in the deepest depths of rural Wiltshire doesn’t mean being divorced from retail reality. And sometimes I think the big boys might even learn something from our modest enterprise.

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