The early birds Dana & Julian….We joined the Kingfisher team nearly a year ago and as two of the early birds we have been surprised at just how much goes on before the doors open at 9am. So grab a coffee, put on a good tune, as we do on our arrival at 7am and we will tell you a little more about the early hours of Kingfisher life. It is our job to bring all of the trays of fresh produce out of the cold room that were kept in there overnight. Yes, all the fresh produce is put away at night and empty, clean trays are laid out ready for the morning when we arrange the fresh displays and check the quality of the produce. There’s rarely 2 weeks that are the same because when Marion returns from market there is often something new that has just come into season to put in the shop… But it’s not just as simple as that! Displaying the produce according to the seasons, colours and shapes is something that we had never given much thought to. Now we find that making the shop look beautiful for our customers is one of our favourite parts of the day. In our first year here, we have been introduced to fruits we have never seen before, like kumquats and lychees. Ringden Farm pears and apples have to be our winter favourite and in the summer we really enjoyed the peaches and nectarines…..and the best of all was the local strawberries from Secretts! By 8am quite a lot has happened with the butcher and the two bakers making their deliveries and other members of the team arriving. Temperature and date checks on all the fridges and freezers, washing the counters, displaying the olives, bread and cakes, Stuart going to harvest the watercress, Netty loading the van with deliveries and Mr Barrie coming over to say “good morning” to us all. It is amazing what can be done in the first two hours of the Kingfisher day!
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