Residents of Lydbury North, a small village near Bishops Castle in South Shropshire, are this year celebrating their community shop’s tenth birthday; certainly no mean feat in today’s challenging environment for small businesses.
Ten years on from raising the necessary funding, securing suitable premises and organising essential equipment the shop is still today managed and operated, on a largely non-profit basis, entirely by local volunteers - clearly something of which the community is justly proud.
Clive Moore, Chairman of the village shop committee, commented: "It is to the credit of our volunteers that over these 10 years we have opened seven days a week, fifty two weeks a year, without missing one day - apart from Christmas Day - not even during last winter’s snow and freezing temperatures."
To mark the 10th anniversary local MP Philip Dunne and County Councillor Peter Phillips joined volunteers at the Lydbury North Community Shop and helped plant a tree in the new shop garden.
Philip Dunne congratulated everyone involved in this endeavour saying: “This was a pioneer when first opened 10 years ago and this anniversary is a credit to all the volunteers who have been involved in keeping a shop trading in the village. It provides a flagship example of how the Big Society has been alive and well in Shropshire since long before the term was coined.”
Other ten year anniversary celebration events are planned including a village party and special offers on a selected range of products selling at 2001 prices.