100 Years of Soles: Stourbridge Shoe Trader Goes Online
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00:00Well, my name is Clyde Sowerby. I've been in this shop for 50 years now. I'm just coming up to retirement or semi-retirement because I don't believe in retirement.
00:13Part of that has been influenced by my wife's poor health, but I shall certainly miss the customers.
00:21Well, the business was founded some hundred years ago in 1925 by my uncle Will, who was father's brother.
00:32And that was in Cecil Street in Stourbridge in a garden shed where he did shoe repairs for a penny a tap.
00:39He then moved into one of the neighbours' front room to do his shoe repairs and with gratitude he paid for her rent.
00:52He made enough money then just about to start in the new street shop in Stourbridge, which of course is now Tesco's.
00:59And from there he was a few years and then he gave the shop or leased the shop to his brothers, my father and Uncle Joe, of course, brothers.
01:11They continued and round about 1968 I joined the business.
01:17And from then on, rather than deal with local warehouses, I decided that we'd go to the factories in Northampton, Lancashire, Leicestershire for the ladies.
01:29And we had a particular forte for riding boots.
01:34And actually we had about 400 pairs of riding boots upstairs here.
01:39And that time also we expanded and bought a truck and a trailer and we went to local and nationwide to county shows like the Devon show, the Batham West, the three county show.
01:57We went to numerous point of points.
01:59It was all hard work, but great fun.
02:02And in the middle of all that too, I was a local magistrate for some 22 years, so it was quite a busy life.
02:11The last four or five years we've introduced a website that has been steadily growing in momentum.
02:20And we found in fact that a lot of our customers see that we're a family business, somebody who we can trust.
02:27And it's worked very well.
02:29I put a small advert in the window asking anyone from the college, can they come and help with their experience with the website.
02:38And I've been fortunate that I've had some exceptionally good students to come and give me a hand.
02:44The latest is Ben, who's been with me for two years.
02:47And he's been a great help moving on to greater things, unfortunately, but he'll still be helping with the website.
02:54And that's what I intend to do.
02:57I don't believe in retirement.
02:59As I mentioned, my wife is poorly with leukaemia, but she can help me doing the website.
03:06And I also intend to do the local county shows, just locally, not nationwide this time.
03:14But I think you've got to keep moving.
03:17I've got other interests, like my allotment, that I enjoy.
03:23And I hope to be taking it just a bit easier, but still keeping my mind active.