Same but different
WHEN Louise Christensen opened Worn Out Wares 16 years ago, she never dreamed she would be delivering customers ‘breakfast in bed’.
But that is exactly what she did during the great Covid challenge in a bid to stay connected with her customers and more importantly, keep the till ticking.
“We couldn’t have our customers sitting at our tables so, after many family discussions, we decided to offer takeaways and free home deliveries and we just evolved with the situation, continually adapting what we were doing,” Louise said.
“As stressful as it was deciding for not only for our financial wellbeing but our physical wellbeing, I am really pleased we did it , we were extremely humbled by the support we were given from many of our customers all wanting to ensure we were still standing at the end”
There were a number of organisations that enjoyed a surprise delivery of our Chef Jamie’s house baked scones, jam and cream as a way for Worn Out Wares to say thanks to those essential workers who continued to keep the town functioning where it needed to.
Then there was the change to the shop front, one window exhibiting a display of the beautiful array of eclectic items for sale and the other window, a makeshift grocery store featuring McNamara’s farm produce, cheese and milk from Hunter Belle Cheese, cakes and even flour sold by the cup.
With the help of jobkeeper she was pleased to be able to keep 16 of the 19 staff in their jobs. For those remaining three, two had other jobs they could go to and one was a school student. All are back on deck now that business is heading back to its new kind of normal.
“We are sticking to the four- square metre rule so we are not back at full capacity yet but we will get there,” she said.
On reflection of the experience, Louise had great praise for the government and the way in which it handled the situation.
“I take my hat off to the government, I had enough trouble looking after one business let alone a whole country, it was new ground for everybody.”
*This story was published on Friday, July 3 2020.