Booths is one of my Lovemarks. A north England supermarket that cares about detail, cares about stories, and most importantly, they understand that the art of shopping is not just about convenience or price – it’s in the experience. In the cut throat, bulk-buying industry of supermarket chains, Booths takes the grocery experience back to its roots and slows it down; reminding us that the things we buy should be enjoyed and savored.
Booths creates relationships with people on both sides of the chain of supply and demand. They do it by going that little bit further. For shoppers, they don’t just tell you where the delectable raw milk cheese you’re buying is from, they tell you the backstory on the people who made it. They also offer potatoes dug up that same morning from a garden down the road. That’s one experience you won’t get anywhere else.
They also take care of their producers. Recently Booths has generated a lot of positive PR for themselves by committing to pay dairy farmers a fair price for their milk. Why? Because over the past decade the squeeze on the milk price has seen the number of dairy farmers fall from 25,000 to about 14,500. They can’t make a living. Booths is not the biggest seller of milk in the UK by any stretch, but they want the people they buy from to focus on quality, not survival – and they know their customers will agree. Sure, it makes their products a little more expensive , but as founder Edwin Booth says, “it’s the price the consumer should be paying”.
