Would you like it if your shopping centre was your local public house or somewhere you could have a nice cup of tea or coffee and cake? Would you like your home deliveries to be delivered there so that you don’t have to be in all the time to receive them?
Would you like to cancel all your online subscriptions to things you rarely use but need occasionally but still be able to get these things easily? Would you like to effectively share your subscription with others and for others to be able to share their subscriptions with you?
Would you like your Public House to become a genuine Public House – a home from home for everyone, with books, music, games to play, all good fun?
Have you ever dreamed of having an ice cream machine like the soft swirls sold from vans but then looked at the price of one and thought maybe not? Would you rather have another Italian invention a posh sophisticated coffee machine off your wish list and into reality?
Do you have loads of books or know someone who does and would like to share them with others? Did you stop borrowing books from your public library because you were so engrossed in them and other aspects of your life you forgot to return them and were fined so put off permanently?
This could be the case. Your dreams could be reality. Also other dreams could come true too. The dreams about going green and getting stuff quicker too. Sounds far fetched but here were go:
Horses for courses as they say.
Food delivery costs as you have to buy £40 worth of food in order to get it delivered. You might not need £40 worth of food. People are often forced to buy say a bag of vegetable in one go when they actually only need one of those vegetables in that bag. It is better when they are fresher. Frozen food in the 70s was like a pick and mix, you only bought what you needed https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02mp4f3
like this:
The same could apply to tinned food. It can be cheaper and use less metal from a bigger can, many of us have used half a can of beans and saved the other in the fridge not to fancy them again until they are off. If there was somewhere so near home where you could get just what you needed then the other half of the can would not go to waste. They may be near enough for you to go to to have a full English made for you without you having to wake up too much to be reasonable before you started it, and know you well enough to remember what you like and when, you could just say you’re on your way.
When I have seen the recent dry goods zero plastic non-packaged shops I’ve done the maths and found them to be far too pricey for me. I do remember a shop in Swindon called Gran’s where you could get all sorts of stuff including different cake mixes, soup mixes, cereals, flour, sugars, fruit, nuts, sweets, and many others – you put these into a simple plastic bag, it was weighed and sealed, it was very good value. And then there are the pick and mixes we used to get in Woolies. We need to be able to only buy what we need, but in order for this to happen it needs to be at the correct price for what its worth. Eco purchasing should not be the preserve of a select few.
I ordered for a friend an old fashioned car barber chair for children for her business as I thought that would be good for it, we could have paid over £150 to have it flown in quite quickly, we both thought that this was unreasonable so chose land and sea. This did take a lot of time but it eventually arrived (it was post pandemic so we factored that in and were patient) We could track this as soon as it arrived in the UK but not before.
There are plane trackers and there are ship trackers, so with a simple QR code scanned on the item at the start, then when it goes into a container, then the container when it goes into a ship, the ship and the lorry can be tracked, I have worked at Amazon and from the driver’s phone location triangulation data the van your item is on is tracked all the way, you know where it is at home when it is 9 stops away. So this is simply possible for any organisation for whatever transport mode your item is being moved with.
I think knowing your item is moving and whereabouts it is helps you opt for the slower greener option. This is because you tend to go for next day delivery for reassurance that you will not have to worry for so long that it will arrive. Some items you do need quickly, most you don’t.
There would be different distribution streams:
Frozen
Refrigerated
Ambient Food
Non-Food
Oversized
Specialist
I did think of a 3rd class Green Postage Stamp before they did a recent barcode stamps which now include a green colour. The reason for the 3rd class is due to the speed guarantee of the 1st and the 2nd.
Instead of vans I’m dreaming of riders on horseback, cyclists, walkers, canal boaters, rowers, sailors, people on their daily commute making it pay for itself by carrying a rucksack along the way, so not only them but someone else’s personal post or parcel is also getting closer to its destination too. These backpacks would have QR codes on them like the containers, and the individual who picks it up would need to scan the train they are getting on and scan the station when they arrive, and place it where told for it to continue to go where it needs to, to get paid for the journey. This system would operate in a similar way but with scanning a location post, the bag, then travel, then the location place post at the end of the journey. These journeys could be very short, a few local streets. These local streets could have personal properties who make it their business to act as local delivery points. They could deliver to their local streets all times of the day as items arrive or keep them in their homes or businesses to be picked up, whatever the recipient would like.
The postage would be cheap for this. The packages and bags to be carried would be priced up clearly, so you could choose a lighter lower paying one or a heavier better paying one or more than one at a time. You could make this weight-lifting a part of your exercise routine, make work of your work-outs and work outside too! It all adds up.
Really as long as an item is moving then it is on its way. In Victorian England people were able to get post within a day and the motor can, van and lorry had not been invented – there were ships, trains, horsepower and runners on foot.
The way this would be organised is a bit like an atomic structure many hub with major and minor hubs and multi spoke connections. Items would flow through like electrons, up to the largest hub necessary to be delivered back down to the smallest local hub. Items can also connect to form the shortest possible route. Currently major postal organisations lorry items miles away and then back to deliver them, this is neither efficient, nor green or quick.
What would happen with your item is that you would take it to your local delivery point. You would either address it there or at home. The address would also be a desired delivery path. The postage would be paid and a QR code of the destination address printed and placed on it. The QR code would direct delivery like a homing pigeon heads for home. It would allow itself to be picked up if the person picking up the item (with other items) is heading in the correct direction. There are 2 options for this; 1 as the bird flies it is going forward to that location, 2 it is getting nearer to a more major hub, upping its number of opportunities to take it on further. Many deliverers would head to more major hubs to get more work, some could concentrate on major hub to major hub, others perhaps prefer local interactions to make friends as a bonus. Some massive hub to massive hub work can be taken up by those with lorries and vans to fill on an empty return journey from, for example, a factory parts delivery, they can really pack items in to make that pay, in that sense their fuel filled journeys at least have a purpose to them so in that way they are more green. Bus companies at major commuting periods have the passengers bearing the loads, when they are quieter and less revenue raising, which would create viability for rural routes, they could fill their seats with parcels, and some of them in rarely used routes, allowing all people to move freely from village to village, under used farm barns could act as major hubs when the season suited them. Shire horses and other rare breeds like pack horses could be brought back into action and human use here and pay for their keep. It’ll be lovely for all to hear the relaxing sounds of horses hooves and the valuable fertilizer compost they produce will be good for rhubarb and other growers.
Talking about farms and produce, most food we buy is often packaged at the same place, it is the same product inside. I worked at Anchor butter and it was the same butter inside the economy brand, the own label, the branded and the up market, you are paying more for a different piece of paper. A tray of Mediterranean vegetables looks the same at Waitrose and Aldi because it is the same, you pay for posh packaging. Walkers make crisps for others, different quality same factory. This is pretty much universal, especially products with very specific and expensive manufacturing machinery. In essence you are paying for a label.
I used to love the mostly white packaging of economy foods in the early 1990s as they all went with each other and with my white kitchen, so much so I convinced myself that I preferred some that initially I didn’t as they looked so good. I do wonder why tinned goods labels are plastic covered paper so it’s shiny as that does not help food preservation in any way and makes it not recyclable. Really the food facts are all that is required – a name of what it is, a barcode for transactions and a QR code for information. If the information is to be written it helps if the text size is large enough to actually be read.
I like the green part of leaks and the green leathery leaves of cabbage and lettuce, yet these are missing and only the whiter less tasty parts are left and then these are packaged in plastic to make them sweat to go off faster. This is a surreal practice as the plant packages itself with protection and prior to transportation this plant protection is stripped away, no wonder it goes off so fast. Also a soil film and a bit of root makes it think it is still in the ground, it keeps growing a bit as it moves closer to you so that could be fresh on arrival.
Again the labelling of these is very simple, and as they are one ingredient only one name is necessary for it. A label stuck on the bottom with what it is, a barcode and a QR code for further information. Strawberries go off not in straw or a dry, breathable package, though people have tried glass jars which works very well, on the move in a cardboard and straw combination would be best, if farmers grew cereals with slightly higher stems good use could be made of them.
With this community cupboard it could mean that people like me who liked the green bits best could buy only those and those who preferred the white hearts could eat those to their hearts desires. Everybody’s happy. With this public public house idea as they would be serving food in the proximity, unlike in a supermarket vegetable area, they could cut the leeks as you required. When you buy cut cabbage and lettuce in a bag from a shop you can really tell that they have just been chucked into a machine and hacked to shreds, this also goes off faster than anything else. Cut up vegetables as you can get cuts from a butcher could happen here easily.
When it comes to distribution farmers do not need to go via the middle man, so they get the full cut of worth of their item. The only thing they’d need to factor in is the costs of moving the item from farm to near fork, the one that would fork out for that would be the person buying the goods. This would mean that the price would be right and the profit for the farmer too. Also the silly supermarket says they’ll buy your produce than backs off leaving it unsold without the contract allowing you to sell it elsewhere will be gone, and all the waste of it with it. They can also leave items in the ground to keep growing until they get a sale, this would mean it is fresher. As they are not selling to specific requirements putting stuff in plastic bags requiring them to wash off what with preserve the item best in transit it’ll be an easier deal all round. The Public Houses could have large Belfast sinks with wide drain pipes so they won’t get blocked, with an exit to the ground so any product that takes this route can be retrieved, also the muddy water will be good for the ground for growing flowers for a beautiful environment. The farmers will be able to sell all their stock and would be free to rate it differently for, for example schools and care homes. They could sell in multiple classes of product, broadening possibility.
People make choices based on supermarkets near them and ones that it is possible to have items delivered from – providing they want a tonne of stuff all at once from them, 40 quid’s worth usually. When you roam around, or travel elsewhere you can find exciting products that you cannot buy near to you. Some supermarkets that are good do not display what they have to offer online, so you cannot do an online shop around, which is what I usually do, some I only know about via a leaflet drop. Others are overseas items, some you love but can only get when you are on holiday. I see it as a possibility that you could request that these are sold via a system that could link to Embassies. The specific product I kept trying to find is Nocilla Leche with a pale blue lid, a product from España it was only available in bulk for diplomats which I did not think was very diplomatic. Now shipping costs are prohibitive. Travelling to France I found many products I fancied which I could not buy at home, many in tins, so it would be perfectly reasonable to have these shipped. Some requests could await a bulk transport for a good price, like the different speed classes for mail. It would be possible to get tins of Irish Stew from Ireland this way, so you know that you’ve got the real thing. Some items for example rabbit are hard to purchase in England, so these requests could be published so that those who could provide this product but were uncertain about a market for it would have this risk lessened so could go ahead confidently.
Also during covid I experienced discrimination in stores that was unwarranted as I was doing all things as required, I worked throughout, it seemed that those that didn’t got better treatment. This is why I cannot obtain what I previously could, including specialist and seasonal fruit and vegetables. I do not see it as fair that this should exclude me from what I want and I do not feel it is a just or sensible response to shop in these places again, if they don’t want me then they should not have my money. If this idea bears fruit then all that suffering is a blessing in disguise for all. I hope it does.
I watch cooking programmes and find Saturday Kitchen to be my relaxing weekend viewing. Chefs come in and prep and cook their dishes in the set kitchen there. Cooking programmes feature chefs touring and cooking in all sorts of places and venues. Yet many of these same chefs house static restaurants which can be a bit of a trek to reach. They have a certain number of covers, places they can serve a meal for, numbers of meals they can serve in their location. Popular ones have a waiting list, fully booked up for weeks, sometimes months, meaning you cannot get in and the restauranteur cannot profit from their skills to the benefit of their diners. Other professions go on tour to work, musicians, comedians, trades persons and so on. With getting entertainment you pay for this in advance, with this idea proposal it would be more workable done this way. So it would be perfectly possible for chefs to do likewise. When you organise a workplace Christmas meal colleagues choose what they want to eat from the menu well in advance at work, usually they are told to decide by a certain date, with keen pressure applied to be fairly fast about it. So chefs could do the same with these Public Houses and as there would be quite a few in a local area they could perhaps do a few Public Houses on the same day. I’m thinking that they may like to pre-prepare their starters. I’m imagining they would do nearly all prep before they arrive, chopping things and measuring for example. All items could be delivered early to all locations. The dessert course could be cooked whilst the main is being enjoyed. The touring Head Chef could be there only for the Mains introducing themselves to the diners, and for them to only be there for an hour if they wanted to get round a town full of venues on the same date, sittings could start for an early lunch or a late breakfast and go on to late into the night. A huge plus for them is the bill savings for a permanent restaurant venue. With this comes the freedom to go on holiday when you feel like it, and to not have to endure the gruelling hours day after day after day, which will be both a blessing for them and a boon for recruitment for the sector. Getting around is much more fun too, you get to meet a lot more people.
Requesting is something that is done in libraries, when you cannot find the book that you are after but another library has it or another reader, so you get to be able to read that particular book as soon as possible. These Public Houses could have books to read too, many characterful pubs do have books, but they are mainly for looking at, you want to pick them up and read them, if only you could. I’m thinking a library room or area in these Public Houses would be great complete with comfy sofas, great light and a cosy warm room. This would certainly save on heating at home and it is green to share the same created heat with others.
Other rooms could be hobby rooms for sewing and art, if people needed things repairing others could do this for them, and they could reciprocate their talents with others. Some could casually bake cakes for people to eat and cups of tea and coffee.
We subscribe to many things, Amazon is about £8 so with this providing so much more and you could delete that one, and probably many others too, so Public Houses would, quite reasonably, require their members to pay something, £10, £15, £20 per month, that sort of thing, whatever pays the bills, which could be posted on a notice board alongside membership subscriptions paid so everyone is kept informed of outgoings and incomings. Someone would hold responsibility and make decisions, but barring people on personal preference would not be allowed, only unreasonable destructive behaviour on site, so everyone feels included and does not fear a humiliating exclusion on entry. The more the merrier, in the right sort of way, these are daytime Public Houses, not drinking dens. I think part of the demise of pubs is the behaviour of drunks, and disturbance in the local areas is not acceptable, people have a human right to a good night’s sleep. These Public Houses could be open at night for the benefit of insomniacs, night shift workers and another example I can think of is new parents woken up at night by babies who are not in a pleasant pattern of sleep for parents, yet. There could be plenty of board games so no-one gets bored, for kids, for grown-ups and for those in their second childhoods. When people have done a jigsaw to death they could pass this one on to another Public House. Perhaps people could play fair to the creators of these who are still with us and get together to give them a little something to encourage them on and allow them to have a fun life too. This is so easy these days.
As regards dancing to music, this could be done if you have an appropriate floor and good sound insulation during the day, you can get energy to recharge for this and rehydration too. People could learn musical instruments together and sing too in this same room. They could even give impromptu or prepared performances for the benefit of their public in these Public Houses! Happy Days!
