Refurb for century-old village butchers has transformed firm's fortunes, says owner

Jack Binks, owner of R H Binks and Sons Butchers in East Ardley, West Yorkshire, chose to refurb the store after a post-Covid drop in sales left the business struggling to survive.

“All I keep hearing is about shops shutting down,” he said.

“One of the guys I deliver to has said he won't be able to stand till next year, and a lot of people are in the same boat.

“The refurb has made us really busy, otherwise we would have probably been just like them.

“It has turned round massively - we’ve seen a lot of new faces, we even had a woman and her son come in who have lived in the village all their lives but have never been in the shop."

Mr Binks took over the business after his father took ill around five years ago, moving back to his hometown from Cheltenham in order to look after the shop.

“When I came back I looked at the company and thought ‘it's a good business, but we need to drive it forward,’” he said.

The family run butchers business began in 1920, starting life as a milk supplier.

“Before 1920 we were a dairy farm,” explained Mr Binks, “Then one day, they took a heifer to market by walking it from Outwood to Wakefield.

“But it didn't make the money they wanted for it, so they walked it back home again, killed it in the slaughterhouse and took the meat on the milk round with them.

“Then next week came and everyone was asking for the meat - so that's how they started the butchers business.”

As well as a refurb, the shop has also started to sell new products, which Mr Binks hopes will bring in a broader range of customers.

The shop now stocks pies and other ready meals, as well as stocking alcohol from local breweries and distilleries.

The change in stock is also part of Mr Binks vision to bring in a younger generation of customers into the shop, something he notes is an issue across the butchers industry.

“Average age of our customers is probably forty to fifty, and getting the younger customers is a really hard thing to do,” he said.

“Some people are scared by it because they can go into a supermarket and see that steak is a fiver, whereas in a butchers we often sell by the kilo or pound.

“Some people are a bit intimidated - and we’ve got to try and break that barrier, which is why we have really friendly staff so we can try and help educate people when they come in - and hopefully get some young people in.

“And it's not just our shop, it's across the board - it's a dying trade and a dying skill - electricians and plumbers, they're a skilled trade, but we are as well, it just isn't categorised like that because it's retail.”

Mr Binks noted that although the refurb has led to an uptake in custom, he was still apprehensive before doing it.

“I was scared - even while it was in the first week - you think it was busy for a couple of days then you hit a quiet spell for an hour and you think to yourself ‘What is going on?’” he said.

“But you've just got to put everything you can into it.

“My dad never pushed me into the business - he said ‘its long hours, hard work and its never been the best pay’.

“But I want to carry on that family tradition to pass it down to the next generation.

“We’ve been running for 102 years, and I want us to be running another 100 more.”