Tower and Town, April 2019

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Packaging Not Included

On Saturday 23rd February, Haley Lambert opened Packaging Not Included just off Marlborough High Street in Hughenden Yard. Her shop is all about no waste and making it easy for people to shop without any added waste. She does this by telling people to come with their own containers, and she uses larger, more sustainable containers that customers can take a spoonful or more out of and put it into their own containers. She sells: organic soaps; organic fruit and vegetables; some non-organic caster sugar; and flour. Any fruit and vegetables that are past their best, is put outside on a little table and she offers them for free, so they don’t go to waste.

Miss Lambert has two main challenges that she faces: one of them is time management, as her shop is very new, and she needs to observe when and who her customers come and are, and then she can form a working ‘timetable’ and manage her time more easily. Another challenge is stock control, as because her shop is new, she doesn’t know how many customers will come, and how much they will buy.

Miss Lambert’s main suppliers are: Infinity Food Co-Operative, Essential Trading Company, and the soaps and balms are sourced from individual independent stores. She prefers independent stores, as their produce is often more organic. As well as these stores, she sources from local stores such as Rudies Bakery and Organic Herb Trading Company.

Miss Lambert is thoroughly enjoying her new business. Her previous job was a saxophone teacher at Marlborough College, but she will stop this at Easter and her business will then be her main job. She is not very worried how Brexit might affect her business, as she doesn’t like to worry about that sort of thing, and it remains so uncertain. Also, all her sources are from Britain and not from Europe and her business will most likely not be affected by Brexit.

Hayley Lambert hasn’t found a particular trend in customers yet, as they come in all shapes and sizes and she hasn’t been there long enough yet to see a pattern emerging. Many people are coming to see what the shop is all about, but there are already lots of local customers who have made visiting the shop part of their routine.

We asked her whether she already had any funny stories worth telling that might have happened in her shop and she said, ‘There was a ‘cornflakes all over the floor’ incident once, and although it wasn’t very funny at the time, now looking back on it it’s very funny!”.

Samantha Pickering and Saffron Rowell