The industry to be in

There might be a recession on (OK so we have supposedly come out of recession but it still feels like there is a recession on), but there is one industry which appears to be thriving, growing, almost as rapidly as Swine Flu didn’t

In the time it took me to walk the ½ mile or so from the station to the hotel I lost count, they were everywhere...

The Pound Shop

Poundland, Everything a Pound, PoundWorld, The £1 store, Poundzilla (actually I’ve made the last one up, but if anyone does open the chain I want it made clear that I thought of the name!)

There are even the sub pound – 99p store, Everything 99p

All these, several of them with multiple stores, in that short walk.

I know that Coventry has been particularly hit by the down turn of manufacturing, but even then, how does a town support that number of £1 store without destroying all of the rest of its stores.

I have this horrible image of Coventry in a couple of year’s time just made up of pound stores.

Oh, and Greggs, there were several hundred of them as well!

Limerick – Shopping for the brave, or hairy

On the way to the bus station I walked up the street from the hotel and was amazed by the sheer number of hairdressers that there were, it appeared that every other shop was offering hair styling, I counted at least five and there were probably a few I had ignored before realising there were so many of them.

Given that the city and region only has a population of around 80,000 I have to wonder how they all stay in business,

Then I noticed the local pharmacy. In it’s display in the window was a display of all the usual things you would expect, cough medicine, indigestion relief pills, antiseptic cream, cow worming tablets

Yes, I did a double take as well, but there stacked along side the “human” medicine was a wide variety of potions (and lotions, you really don’t want to know) for our four footed friends.

Perhaps there is a link between the cow worming pills and the hairdressers?