On Saturday night, I was tidying up the shop, my shop, after a busy day. The news announced the death of Sir Terence Conran, founder of habitat.
habitat was where my career began. Long before I started working there, I was in love with habitat. Each Christmas, we’d make a family shopping trip to the Whitgift Centre in Croydon. Oh yes, heady days… We’d have lunch in British Home Stores, plus visit the other shops (probably for me to buy some Christmas tat for my family with my pocket money). But the highlight for me, was always habitat. I simply loved that shop. Mum and Dad could have left me there all day, and I’d have been delighted.
This was the late 70s. Most homes had orange and brown vinyl wallpaper in the kitchen, sensible sideboards, blankets and bedspreads. But oh, habitat was another world - bright, primary colours and simple designs, which might be Scandinavian, French, Indian or classically English, but definitely not a style you’d see in 1970s suburban England. Modular sofas, roller blinds and tableware or cutlery that you could buy as individual pieces (no 30-piece stuffy china sets here). Duvets (other shops still sniffily called them ‘continental’ quilts) had 100% cotton covers, plus there were stripey durries, huge piles of wicker log and linen baskets and super cool lighting.
This was a lifestyle shop even before the word ‘lifestyle’ was used. And let’s not forget the stacks of pillar box red teapots and mugs. To me, this was heaven. habitat’s stock was all loose on the shelves or stacked high on wooden delivery pallets on the floor, which you could touch, (as long as you were careful). The pine shelves had plastic shelf edge strip where prices were clearly displayed. So unlike the rather stuffy and middle-aged departments stores of the time.
And, even if I wasn’t their target customer, I could buy a copy of their annual catalogue. At home, this was pored over, names of products learnt - Old Colonial, Cherry Berry Bim, Hubbard and Woodstock and I distinctly remember planning houses and furnishings, working out what to buy and how much it would cost. I was a mini-me homemaker!
So after A-levels, there really was only one company to apply to. I wrote applications to 3 stores and started work at the Bromley branch. Although the shop was small in size, it was a pocket power house with the second largest turnover per square metre in the company. Our uniform was a green sweat shirt and denim. Denim for work?! After the old-lady-nylon-overall uniform of my Saturday job at Woollies, this felt sooo modern.
I started in the Kitchenware department - preparing manual orders every week, unpacking deliveries and stacking shelves. I learned how to wrap the china in tissue before packing in the lovely green paper carrier bags. I loved being efficient on a busy till (although I wasn’t so fond of the cumbersome clickety clack card machine. I signed up people for the cool red and green habitat credit card and also advised customers how to shop without an assistant hovering behind them, “Yes, you can just pick the products off the shelf and put them in your basket"… * *even after 35 years, I said the exact same phrase to a first-time customer yesterday, who was eyeing up all the fabrics in Hometown!
The next 2 years I worked in all the departments at the Bromley shop - loved the fabrics in the Walls and Windows department, hated flooring (oh, those dusty deliveries of seagrass matting in hessian bales). I also worked on stock-takes, learnt the admin side of the daily banking and how to send the sales to head office by a kind of ticker tape machine (analogue days, folks!). I planned the toy and Christmas departments and loved the energy and time pressure of the stock arriving and getting it all out on sale. My family Christmas presents suddenly went up a notch - Hyacinth bulb growing kits for Mum, became a favourite each year.
I was tasked with planning the product layouts for a new store as my Area Manager said I’d got a logical brain… Working in Norwich followed as part of the store opening team. This was such fun as a small team of us stayed in a hotel for a month and ate out every evening - living the high life! After Norwich, came moves onto Wythenshawe, Kingston, Glasgow, Bath and finally Wallingford. This was where the magic happened as far as the shop staff were concerned, as the company was divided into stores and the Wallingford head office.
I’ve always kept the old catalogues and looking through them today, I see familiar products and it reminds me of the terrifying merchandise meetings where all new items were approved. At two earlier meetings the buyers would present product samples to the UK buying team first (elimination round 1!), next the rest of the UK management team (elimination round 2!), before the final meeting with Terence, habitat France and conrans USA.
For a young buyer, this was like a meeting with God. Depending on his mood, he could be genial, puffing away on cigars, or crabby (also puffing away on cigars). He loved functional and functioning products. He hated frippery. So, never ever present a tea pot without testing it first to check it poured well. You’d know that Terence would test it and would erupt if it didn’t function and dribbled over the conference table. Being in these meetings was both terrifying and exhilarating. Even though he was no longer in charge of the minutiae of every product on the shelves, he did have the final approval. He always said that even though we were a large buying team, our range should look like it was chosen with one eye, for clarity and consistency.
Of course with rose tinted glasses, it’s easy just to remember the fun and good bits from any past job. But on any given day, in my own emporium, I’m putting into practice my 8-year ‘apprenticeship’ at habitat. Whether I’m selecting products to sell at Hometown - does it fit? - does it work? - does it say Hometown? Maybe I’m tidying and replenishing the shelves, or planning new displays to make the shop a welcoming and inspirational space for customers. There’s daily cashing up and doing my accounts; even if I’m my own head office and my accounts are done digitally, the books have to balance. Finally it’s a mix of ancient and modern, as I manually stock check for orders and update the website inventory.
And now it’s time for another cup of tea and a toast to Terence. And before you ask, of course it’s from a teapot that pours properly, made at Pristine Pottery in Stoke-on-Trent. Appropriately enough it’s in a blue I think the man himself would have approved of. Thank you Terence, for giving me a lifetime love of design and retailing.