“We hadn’t been here long before Janet in the Post Office said we should volunteer because it was a good way of getting to know people.  Someone else pointed out that the shop was a great place to pick up the village gossip – or start the gossip if we wanted to!”

“We’d enjoyed volunteering for things in the past, so decided we could do an hour or two a week.  We gave ourselves a few months to settle in and signed up early in 2020.  That was shortly before the first lockdown when the shop became a lifeline for the village.  Suddenly we were busy with shifts in the shop plus shopping for people shielding, but that way we got to know more people more quickly than we would have done otherwise.”  

“It’s been good to learn new skills like how to operate a till and it’s fun meeting the cross-section of Huby & Sutton residents and passers-by who use the shop, especially when there’s chance for a chat.  And it means when we pass people in the street, we often know them from seeing them in the shop.  We’ve also made some good friends among the other volunteers and enjoy the volunteer socials.”   

“The shop is a great asset to Huby and Sutton and it’s good to be playing a small part in keeping it going.”