COMMENT:
When I was a lad, New Zealand was a different place. There was no such thing as big-box retailing and we all shopped at local retailers owned by people we knew. Sure, the selection was less rich, but it made things far simpler. Best of all, the fact that the person selling us vegetables, the latest Phillips HiFi systems, or servicing our Mk1 Cortina probably lived around the corner from us and was involved in the same community groups that we were made good service a real imperative.
One of the earliest forays into a new type of retailing was from a company by the name of LV Martin and son. Started in the 1930s, my earliest memories of the business were of TV ads featuring Alan Martin, presumably the son of said LV. Each advert finished up with Alan clearly stating: "If it's not right we'll put it right and it's the putting right that counts."
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Essentially Alan's angle was that instead of buying from little Mum and Dad shops with tiny scale, buying from the Martin clan meant you'd have the heft to get better prices, but the personal service and after-sales care that you were used to from your local store would still be there. The best of both worlds. And it stood LV Martin in good stead - the company survived until only a few years ago when it was acquired by Smith's City. That's close to 80 years and three generations, not at all bad for retailing.