Any of these shops (wooden shelf/drawer ladder general stores) remain existent ? in Australia or Britain.
Look at the sketch the last time i saw a shop such as that was very oddly in around 1999-2000 but as would expect it was in such a town as Cootamundra (remote area) , Most of those types of stores were gone around 1975, many because the owners as i saw up to 2000 AKA died on the job and it then closed after the two or three generation stint of anything from 50 - 120 years.
More than that, the customer himself was probably never actually officially educated or retarded but allowed to run their own affairs without help, they were banished to the retardation institutions around 1975 also.
Select to expand quotejapie said..
Many. But they are all in Fiji!
Really meant in the context of Britain and Australia, but thus of Fiji ? Is that layout modern or just left-over?
Both the customer and shop system are long gone.
Bunnings and more recently Masters are mostly to blame for the demise of small traders. When Masters opened in Bundall on the God Coast,
the Mitre 10 shop around the corner which had been there for years shut up shop.
I'm sure that this would have been happening all around the country. Masters have gone but damage done. Bunnings still remain and continue to expand.
You could say this about all the small business in the country but it's unfortunately the way things are now. No competition definitely does not mean lower prices as claimed in the ad's
I don't mind Bunnings per se, and I did prefer the small, local hardware shops.
I think the only reason I "hate" Bunnings is that I don't often need more than a few screws, and to get them now involves:
- driving
- finding a car park
- walking 2km from the car park i eventually found, in blazing sun.
- walking a further 2km directly to the "nuts and bolts and stuff" section.
- searching for an hour or two for the type of screws I need.
Going to the hardware store is now a mission that takes well over an hour. 
Perhaps I don't mind because there is always someone selling snags out front. 
Select to expand quoteevlPanda said..
I don't mind Bunnings per se, and I did prefer the small, local hardware shops.
I think the only reason I "hate" Bunnings is that I don't often need more than a few screws, and to get them now involves:
- driving
- finding a car park
- walking 2km from the car park i eventually found, in blazing sun.
- walking a further 2km directly to the "nuts and bolts and stuff" section.
- searching for an hour or two for the type of screws I need.
Going to the hardware store is now a mission that takes well over an hour.
Perhaps I don't mind because there is always someone selling snags out front.
except when I only need 6 screws, and have to but a 100 pack....
Select to expand quoteJulianRoss said..evlPanda said..
I don't mind Bunnings per se, and I did prefer the small, local hardware shops.
I think the only reason I "hate" Bunnings is that I don't often need more than a few screws, and to get them now involves:
- driving
- finding a car park
- walking 2km from the car park i eventually found, in blazing sun.
- walking a further 2km directly to the "nuts and bolts and stuff" section.
- searching for an hour or two for the type of screws I need.
Going to the hardware store is now a mission that takes well over an hour.
Perhaps I don't mind because there is always someone selling snags out front.
except when I only need 6 screws, and have to but a 100 pack....
They are for the "box of useless things" that sits in your garage, akin to the "bag of useless cables" that sits in your laundry closet.
Just to point it 1 The shop they are standing in is a hardware and general store combination, but the point with that is the drawers and shelf system is actually a 19th century technique that was in operation up to 1975 by many local AKA "industrial general stores".
What you are looking at is a method (store layout and store-keeping) that is over 100 years old an the equipment design of it also over 100 years old, however, it was seriously in common use in Australia and Britain up to 1975 !
One such store to recently be closed is called Fracks pumps and Hydraulics in Sydney outer CBD, if you ever knew it , it was anything but a "combination" general store but had other far fetched lines of sales all over it.
I cannot find many pictures of these types as they are something that were in the thousands all over Australia and look identical to the sketch.
It itself to have seen it is immensely rare now to know of it, most of what is published is simply department store like or when general store only food shelf not drawer system.
Select to expand quoteJulianRoss said..evlPanda said..
I don't mind Bunnings per se, and I did prefer the small, local hardware shops.
I think the only reason I "hate" Bunnings is that I don't often need more than a few screws, and to get them now involves:
- driving
- finding a car park
- walking 2km from the car park i eventually found, in blazing sun.
- walking a further 2km directly to the "nuts and bolts and stuff" section.
- searching for an hour or two for the type of screws I need.
Going to the hardware store is now a mission that takes well over an hour.
Perhaps I don't mind because there is always someone selling snags out front.
except when I only need 6 screws, and have to but a 100 pack....
I am lucky. There is still a small local hardware store around here, despite being near one of the biggest Bunnings around. When I have to go to Bunnings I try and go early or late, and even then I buy what I have to there, and buy the normal stuff at the small hardware store on the way home. The local store rewards my loyalty with a discount, and I don't have to fight through old people, prams, kids, slow walkers, and all the fun that Bunnings entails.
Select to expand quoteFormulaNova said..JulianRoss said..evlPanda said..
I don't mind Bunnings per se, and I did prefer the small, local hardware shops.
I think the only reason I "hate" Bunnings is that I don't often need more than a few screws, and to get them now involves:
- driving
- finding a car park
- walking 2km from the car park i eventually found, in blazing sun.
- walking a further 2km directly to the "nuts and bolts and stuff" section.
- searching for an hour or two for the type of screws I need.
Going to the hardware store is now a mission that takes well over an hour.
Perhaps I don't mind because there is always someone selling snags out front.
except when I only need 6 screws, and have to but a 100 pack....
I am lucky. There is still a small local hardware store around here, despite being near one of the biggest Bunnings around. When I have to go to Bunnings I try and go early or late, and even then I buy what I have to there, and buy the normal stuff at the small hardware store on the way home. The local store rewards my loyalty with a discount, and I don't have to fight through old people, prams, kids, slow walkers, and all the fun that Bunnings entails.
Old people WTF. Fight your way through old people, just listen to yourself.
Select to expand quoterockmagnet said..FormulaNova said..JulianRoss said..evlPanda said..
I don't mind Bunnings per se, and I did prefer the small, local hardware shops.
I think the only reason I "hate" Bunnings is that I don't often need more than a few screws, and to get them now involves:
- driving
- finding a car park
- walking 2km from the car park i eventually found, in blazing sun.
- walking a further 2km directly to the "nuts and bolts and stuff" section.
- searching for an hour or two for the type of screws I need.
Going to the hardware store is now a mission that takes well over an hour.
Perhaps I don't mind because there is always someone selling snags out front.
except when I only need 6 screws, and have to but a 100 pack....
I am lucky. There is still a small local hardware store around here, despite being near one of the biggest Bunnings around. When I have to go to Bunnings I try and go early or late, and even then I buy what I have to there, and buy the normal stuff at the small hardware store on the way home. The local store rewards my loyalty with a discount, and I don't have to fight through old people, prams, kids, slow walkers, and all the fun that Bunnings entails.
Old people WTF. Fight your way through old people, just listen to yourself.
Calm down buddy. Its not like I am actually pushing old people out of the way and then shoulder barging grandmas away from the paint section. I just don't like it when I am trying to walk through somewhere and there are slow people all over the place. I don't even like shopping in a regular shopping centre most of the time.
So, like an intelligent human being, I go there when there are less people, and especially less of the slower people.
Select to expand quoteFormulaNova said..rockmagnet said..FormulaNova said..JulianRoss said..evlPanda said..
I don't mind Bunnings per se, and I did prefer the small, local hardware shops.
I think the only reason I "hate" Bunnings is that I don't often need more than a few screws, and to get them now involves:
- driving
- finding a car park
- walking 2km from the car park i eventually found, in blazing sun.
- walking a further 2km directly to the "nuts and bolts and stuff" section.
- searching for an hour or two for the type of screws I need.
Going to the hardware store is now a mission that takes well over an hour.
Perhaps I don't mind because there is always someone selling snags out front.
except when I only need 6 screws, and have to but a 100 pack....
I am lucky. There is still a small local hardware store around here, despite being near one of the biggest Bunnings around. When I have to go to Bunnings I try and go early or late, and even then I buy what I have to there, and buy the normal stuff at the small hardware store on the way home. The local store rewards my loyalty with a discount, and I don't have to fight through old people, prams, kids, slow walkers, and all the fun that Bunnings entails.
Old people WTF. Fight your way through old people, just listen to yourself.
Calm down buddy. Its not like I am actually pushing old people out of the way and then shoulder barging grandmas away from the paint section. I just don't like it when I am trying to walk through somewhere and there are slow people all over the place. I don't even like shopping in a regular shopping centre most of the time.
So, like an intelligent human being, I go there when there are less people, and especially less of the slower people.
As that is, the sketch up there is near an old person as the customer, certainly don't get those using "homophones" to speak nowdays because they are too slow, all of those were banned to the institutions around '75 because of the problem you are seeing there, now there are only old people too slow, so you are doing better than before '75 when in a hardware store (that's actually an old quaint method called a (longhand) "combination industrial and corner store").
(nb: that original script for the sketch Ronnie Barker wrote sold for over 40,000 pounds at auction).
I cannot find many or any "genuine" pictures of these types of combination store in Australia (internals), they are something that were in the thousands all over Australia (and Britain) and look identical to the sketch.
It itself to have seen it, is immensely rare now to know of it, most of what is published as photos is simply department store like or when general store only food shelf not giant shelf drawer system that goes up to the roof.
