The De Beauvoir Deli Co.

Serving De Beauvoir with the finest bread, meats, cheese, smoked fish, antipasti, coffee, and wine

The De Beauvoir Deli Co. recently opened in our area.

Their website isn't yet operational, but they do have a facebook presence. I'm not on facebook, so I'm not sure whether they have more information available about their organisation - particularly the background and experience of those who run it.

In the absence of any, this review only hazards a guess based on my experience as a customer.

Our time is now

The first few weeks of opening for any retailer is a critical time. It is in that time that customers will form an opinion. That opinion will in turn determine whether they might continue to provide their custom, or not.

In that time I experienced 3 significant issues. Limited opening times, limited stock and poor customer service.

Times, they are a-changing

On their first week I turned up twice, only to find the owner/manager sweeping the floor and offering nothing more than a genuinely apologetic shrug. I had to wait until the following weekend before I could visit.

The problem was that they closed at 7pm, which seemed to me an incredibly shortsighted strategy.

I don't think that I'm wrong in guessing that their target market is the upwardly mobile professional. Location and pricing would support that assessment.

Less than 6 minutes and about 2 miles from the heart of the City, De Beauvoir and the Islington environs around the deli are home to many City professionals. Like myself, (especially when Xfe's not here) many of them will return home of an evening, picking up something en route for dinner at home on their way.

But, as with my own experience, it is unlikely they'll be getting home before 7pm during the week.

I really want to support the shop being a new, good-looking, venture on my doorstep. Especially as an antidote to the Tesco Metro that had opened only a few months earlier and about 500m further down the street.

But I felt incredibly frustrated having made the deliberate decision not to stop in past Waitrose on my way home, and to buy something for dinner from the De Beauvoir Deli Co. instead, only to find it closed.

I couldn't leave a comment on their facebook wall, so instead I phoned the owner/manager (I did ask if he was either and he told me he was, so I don't know which he is; but let's just call him James - it suited his voice) and told him the closing time was probably problematic to their business.

He tended to agree with me - and they do now open until 8pm which means that I am able to catch them before they close when I get home some weekdays.

I'm guessing James had done his research, but hadn't really thought it through sufficiently. In which case he doesn't come from a business background....



Invite me to buy something I don't want to buy

A low and limited stock in that critical opening period suggested a cash-flow start-up problem.

Fresh produce was lacking. Preserves and longer shelf-life products were more apparent. Shrinkage hurts the wallet...

That suggests that James's pockets are not so deep.

I'm even more certain that he is a less sophisticated trader. I wonder how well he was advised (James-you do have a licence to sell off-sales)?

In the current retail market they should have been able to agree a reasonably beneficial rent-free period. I heard (anecdotal only) that they could have had competition for taking up the location. But I think (again based only on anecdotal chat) that the landlord might have made their decision based on longer-term benefits to their estate, based on competition, rather than on short-term financial benefit.

I think that the fitting out may have been done by the landlord (in the current market they should certainly have paid for it), and that James only had to bring in some of the fittings he wanted.

The configuration of the unit seems strange. It is not typical retail - being side on rather than having depth. This offers more zone A retail space, and higher rent and rates. It's sales to ancillary accommodation looks about 3:1.

In any event, stock levels are looking up, but there is still far less fresh stock than a deli (in my experience as a consumer) typically seems to offer.

Know your product, attend the customer

Some 3 or 4 weeks after opening, it is still the service that frustrates me.

I don't have to shop in the deli. But I want to support them. I really do.

Today after waiting to be served....

...and waiting....

....patiently, fume level rising, I started to be served by Ophelia (names have been made up to protect the innocent) when in the middle of serving me, two friends of James asked if they could leave a note they had scrolled on a napkin or a brown paper bag for him (James may have gone head first through a windscreen it transpires - we wish him well and that he has someone to keep an eye on his business) which she took and disappeared off with - leaving me with my chilli jam and bottle of wine.

On the point of walking out.

For the second time in 3 weeks I was contemplating leaving my purchases on the counter and leaving.

Then, insult to injury, the girl who had been serving me came back and abruptly went off to clean up some pâté following an interruption from the other girl in attendance. No apology, no explanation.

This was after, first time around, I had to wait while server 1 was attending to someone, and server 2 went off to speak to someone who had baked produce for the deli. I may not have minded so, had they just taken and come back, but instead there was a long discussion about plates, layout and general howdy-do-dee.

Sometimes service at the De Beauvoir Deli Co. is not a problem. Often it is.

James - take heed. That's sometimes -vs- often in the wrong proportion for success, my friend.

Unfortunately my experience today is not the first time (I've had to wait, and wait while disorganised staff deal with the novelty of working):

• your system for serving while coffee is made and served is particularly poor.

• your staff do not know their produce.

The De Beauvoir Deli Co. have a rather nice Chillean Merlot I rather like. When it wasn't on the shelf one Saturday afternoon (a busy time when sales could be maximised, James) I asked if they had any in stock.

The server told me she didn't even know what it was. So even before she went off to look for it I suspected her efforts would be lacking success.

Get me out of this here fairytale

So far I've spotted 6 different members of staff at the De Beauvoir Deli Co..

James, 2 other guys, 2 girls.

I'm starting to think James may have roped in his chums and/or family. Some are better than others.

Conclusion (solace that I crave)

Is James family of the De Beavoir estate? Perhaps, but on the balance of probabilities I'd say...no.

Deal or no deal?

Two weeks ago my forecast was that James is definitely going to go out of business.

There are, happily, improvements of recent, but I still fear that there is a more likely than not probability that could happen. I hope not though.

Perhaps I should spend a day or two with James, just showing him stuff, pointing things out.

I might not want to contribute financially, but I'd be happy to spend a weekend with him in the deli, delivering strategies and solutions more likely to result in a successful outcome for him.

I'm not Mary Queen of Shops, but I advise retailers and landlords. I've opened 650,000sq ft of retail/leisure in the last 18 months and recent trips to Manchester and Cannes have been retail focussed. So I have a little more than average knowledge.

And in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.

New Ood, Old Master

I've borrowed this strip of screen grabs, without permission though I have asked, from Dan's Project 76 blog.

Two reasons:

1 spot the new Ood; and

2 isn't there something very Deadly Assassin about the Master. Did you notice?

Accidental or quite deliberate? Perhaps we will find out that the Master's cheating death yet again is linked to events that occurred after he had reached the end of his regeneration cycle (which is why he looked so poorly in the Deadly Assassin).

And isn't Donna still the best latter day companion?

Still In Cannes

Another day, another morning with the sun shining and it's going to be 22C.

Cannes this week, Manchester last week, somewhere else next week...

Arichiwhatwasthatallabouting?

On Saturday night we went back to the Barbican, this time to see the National Theatre of Scotland's co-production with New York based theater company TEAM of Architecting.

Architecting is a musical, multi-media time-bending epic peopled with Scarlett O'Hara pageant contests and anarchistic architects.

It rockets from the American Civil War and the subsequent Reconstruction to a desolate bar in post-Katrina New Orleans where literary legend Margaret Mitchell and presidential grandchild historian Henry Adams watch the country change under their feet.

We were left wondering what it really was all about. We just didn't get it.

It was well acted. But it felt like two plays, or a play that should have been presented in two parts over different nights - each half was over one and a half hours long. (Xfe said, if it was presented in two parts, over two different nights, you wouldn't come back for the second part).

Clearly we were not the only ones who struggled to concentrate and deal with very numb-bumbs, having sat in the same seat for 1hr45m before the intermission, then waiting another 1hr30m after that for the play to end.

Good Morning

I am feeling forever plaid. There is a reason...

From M To C

This time last week it was raining, and I was here:



Now I'm here, (and that is the hotel I'm staying in):



If you're bored, feel free to guess either location.

NaCl

On Friday night Xfe and I went to the Barbican to see They Only Come at Night.

It's a site-specific promenade performance that, after an initial induction, starts with you and 2 others being "abducted" in a van.

When the driver disappears, you are guided through the Barbican's underground car park (and hopefully to safety) aided by a head torch and instructions delivered via headphones, by vampire hunter Quinn.

Random salt circles offer protection on the journey out.

At one point the 3 of you are split up. I was taken into an underground room (a cell?) where I encountered Dr Anne Graham (above) who may or may not have been properly sectioned, and may or may not have murdered 3 of her students.

There was blood on the floor and on the walls, along with her illegible chalk-scrawled notes and theories.

She gave me some salt for my protection and a newspaper cutting. This gave her back story and a link to this site, which claims to prove that vampires are real...

Familiar faces included Victoria Pratt and Lucy Ellinson last seem in Monsters at the Arcola.

Ben Whishaw's Cock

Damn. So far I'm without tickets to see Ben Whishaw in Cock, a new play by Mike Bartlett at the Royal Court.

Ben Whishaw plays John, a happily partnered gay man of seven years who falls in love with a woman.

I feel I owe it to Ben to see him, given that the Google search is Ben Whishaw gay? (or asking about Ben Whishaw's girlfriend) is the biggest referrer to my blog - taking you to one of my favourite posts (that took me a few minutes over 5, one wet bank holiday Monday) Made in Scotland: Is Bank Holiday Monday Gay?

The John Barrowman and Dame Elton John would still be the same (and before you tell me, the Furniture reference is meant to be ironic, as is the use of photos that may be persons other than Dame Elton's spouses).

I've seen Ben Whishaw, in stunning form, on stage before, in Mercury Fur. So good I went to see it twice-in successive weeks.

And whether Ben Whishaw is gay or not, who cares.



He's a great actor and, as Cock's playwright Mike Bartlett says on homosexuality in his recent Guardian interview: "That discussion's totally moved forward and has gone from Anna Friel in Brookside to Dr Who on prime time."

If You're Listening Now

It is Sunday afternoon, and all is peaceful.

Xfe and Cecilia are sleeping...



...though even the slightest click of my phone camera stirs her from her slumber, if only momentarily.



There is no noise whatsoever, save for the comforting tock-tick of our new cuckoo clock.



As I may have mentioned, mon C was recently working in Geneva, and the Chanel team there gave it to him as a little gift by way of thanks. It was (slightly) tongue in cheek, but as we both love kitsch, though me more than Xfe, we were certainly going to hang it.

It's a genuine, hand-made Lötscher Swiss Cuckoo Clock. So, kitsch or not, it is not the tourist tat it at first seemed (to me at least). Read the history of Swiss Cuckoo Clock making here.

It has a hand made clockwork interior and every night we have to wind it up using the chain and weights system.

Peace and quiet.

With just the three of us now.

Chadwick's seat is empty. I still look round, expecting her to be sitting there... or else at my feet or by my side.



Grief I can deal with. But it's loss and consequence that are troublesome.

What I find harder is not to understand why, but to accept that we do carry on with loss, as if everything continues.

I mean, of course it continues, but it's that we continue normally, without the one we loose.

Let me be clear. Chadwick was a cat. She was with me for 18 years. Her death is not the end of the world. It is not the death of a child, of a parent. Something I fear that I will soon have to come to terms with.

Soon, the sadness will pass. But it's the process I find myself thinking about constantly. We are here, she is not. She was, and while she was, she was an active part of our daily life. Part of the fabric of my daily life.

Now she isn't and our daily life continues.

So, where does it continue for Chadwick? Some would have us believe that she is somewhere - even a better place. It is comforting (and convenient) for us to believe that. And I wouldn't want to take away anyone's faith. But I see that belief for what it is - a coping mechanism.

If Chadwick goes on, it is only as a memory. In the minds of those who knew her. Nothing else. Nothing more.

Sadly, and as beautiful as it would be to believe, my analysis, based on evidence and rationale, tells me she is not in her own personal heaven (eating tinned tuna instead of Iams for senior cats) waiting for me.

She is not being cared for by my GrandMa and Granda, not with my Nana and Papa, and she won't be joined by anyone else I love until I can be with them once again.

And that is the essence of what I find so difficult. The seemingly pointlessness of life, of it all.



Though, the love I feel for Christophe, who is still snoozing, and who, like Cecilia, momentarily stirred, blissfully unaware of my momentary sadness, makes it far from that.

And I wouldn't want it any other way.

Don't Rain On My Parade

Just over an hour ago, Chadwick was put to sleep by the vet.

She (yes, I know it's a male name, but I made a promise to myself that I'd name my first pet Chadwick) had been with me for almost 18 years, since she was a kitten.

It was something that I'd been putting off. I did moot the point with Xfe some 5 or 6 weeks ago when he was in China, but when we spoke then, he didn't think it was her time. However last night he said that perhaps it was.

I phoned the vet this morning just after 9am, got an appointment for 9.40am, and only had time to get the cat box, shower, dress and go.

When I left the house with her, I said that we might both be back. But the vet was in agreement with me that it probably was her time, and I came home alone.


So, Chadwick, who has lived with me longer than I lived with my brother, who has shared 3 homes with me and who moved with me from Scotland to London - flying into Heathrow, I will miss you.

Self Service At M&S

The M&S food hall at Finsbury Pavement has gone self-service.

With a bottle of wine, you need to wait for help. So, this evening on my way home, given that I had 2 bottles of their delicious "house" champagne (crisp, dry - delicious) I decided to go to the check-out populated by staff.

However, having unloaded she promptly turned around and told me she was closed.

So I went to the self-service and saw to myself.

Champagne swiped, I had to wait for assistance. When it came she told me to continue, then saw I had a second. I scanned it, machine beeped and while she took the bottles away to rid them of the security tag I finished my shopping, and self-service paid.

Hmmm, I thought on the bus. £28 seemed cheap. I know 3 of the other items came to £10 and the champagne was £14.99 a bottle.



When home I checked the receipt. Sure enough only 1 bottle of Oudinot had been charged - even though the second bottle was scanned and beeped.

Thank you Stuart Rose for that added extra "self-service".

If I went back tomorrow with an overcharge query from today I'm pretty certain I'd be told that having left the store it was too late to assist. If it's good enough for M&S, then it is good enough for me!

Something From The Weekend

So, I went for a wonder around Shoreditch at the weekend, including a trip to Pure Evil's gallery.




I love having Shoreditch and Hoxton on my doorstep. There is something truly vibrant and yet still of independent spirit about the place.