TALKING SHOPS
T’S the big question. No, not what did you have for your dinner or what are you watching on Netflix, which is all we have had to chat about for the past three months.
Have you been to the shops is what we want to know now.
Well I have and I can report that shopping in the time of corona is, as you might expect, very different.
While I wasn’t one of those who queued for hours to be at the front when Zara opened the doors on its summer sale or who threw social distancing to the wind because they were desperate to get their hands on a pair of Nike Air Jordans, I took a little wander around a few stores on Wednesday.
Far from being thronged with customers as they were on ‘Manic Monday’, they were quite quiet.
Shop assistants in plastic visors, hand sanitiser and two-metre markings keeping shoppers apart were the order of the day, while sale stickers were scattered around like confetti at a wedding.
The one way guides on the floor in some stores made me feel like I was in a computer game, and after being told for so long to
‘stay home, save lives and protect the NHS’, this sudden freedom to riffle through clothes rails and consider frivolous purchases like bikinis and tea dresses rather than ‘essentials’ like bread and toilet rolls, felt strange to the say the least.
I actually found myself instinctively recoiling from putting my hands on the clothes at first. After all, just a few weeks ago we were being asked by supermarkets not to touch food unless we planned to buy it. And of course trying anything on is out of the question with changing rooms closed for the foreseeable future.
According to data firm Springboard, Tuesday’s retail footfall in the UK was 35.4% higher than a week before, but it was still down 55.3% on the same day last year.
If you don’t feel ready to hit the shops yet, you don’t have the cash right now to splurge on shoes and clothes, or perhaps you are still ‘shielding’, that is perfectly understandable.
Likewise, if after three months of being largely stuck indoors, you were happy to wait outside your local Primark for a couple of hours just to be able to do something that made you feel a ‘bit more normal’, I get that, I really do.
Boris Johnson has been busy urging Brits to ‘shop with confidence’ and while it is bound to take time for people to return to old high street habits, by going out and shopping we are of course helping to get the economy on its feet, helping to keep stores open and helping to keep people in jobs. As excuses for treating yourself to a new pair of shoes go, that’s hard to beat.
IN OTHER news, it has been reported that when hair salons finally are allowed to reopen (oh blessed day!), hairdressers will be advised to cut back on the chatter.
The National Hair and Beauty Federation released a set of guidelines last month to help businesses prepare for reopening. They are said to include that stylist-to-customer discussions be kept ‘to a minimum’.
While I realise that safety must absolutely be the priority, getting my roots done just won’t be the same if we can’t natter our way through my appointment. As my hairdresser is fond of saying, she does my hair for free.
It is the three hours of therapy that I pay her for.