When Sir Ken Morrison swallowed up the Safeways supermarket chain in a £3bn deal earlier this year, there was a surprise spin-off for Northern shoppers. Morrisons was obliged to sell a number of Safeways stores, and a handful of these in Yorkshire were bought by Waitrose.
So what? So you have never heard of Waitrose? It has a near mythical reputation in its Home Counties heartland for the quality of both its wares and the shopping experience. The arrival of Waitrose in Yorkshire was a bit like the frenzy when Harvey Nichols opened its first regional store in Leeds.
Actually, not quite the same. As far as I know, trainloads of Prada-wearing London scribblers haven't descended on the Otley branch of Waitrose to see how the clog-wearing Northerners have responded to cultured shopping.
Anyway, many yokels already had an alternative regional supermarket. It is called Booths and it started as a single shop, in Blackpool, in 1847. This gave it a head-start on Morrisons and Asda and Marks & Spencer and Sainsbury. The difference is that it didn't get frightfully large.
Today, with the fifth generation running the family business, Booths has 26 stores. Two of them are in Yorkshire: at Ilkley, opened in January, 1997, and at Settle, opened three years ago.
Stores at Kirkby Lonsdale and at Clitheroe attract enterprising cross-border shoppers. Last month, its Kendal store was re-opened, attached to a speciality food shop and restaurant which is a first in the UK. Yorkshire's next Booths, subject to planning approvals, will be in Ripon in 2006.
Booths has been a shrewd operation for a century. It has had cafés in its stores since 1902. Half-a-century later, it converted its 14 stores to self-service, following a trend which had emerged in London. It is still a focused operation and is predominantly a grocer. It doesn't sell hi-fis, it doesn't sell knickers. From Knutsford – its busiest store – to Keswick, its most northerly, Booths has embraced the principles and mechanics of local food. This is its pivotal difference. National awards have recognised that Booths champions the people making food in its region.
This message is not lost on the customers, many of whom have the inclination and the spending power to buy what they perceive to be accountable, albeit sometimes more expensively. "It seems to be what our customers want," says Chris Dee, the Yorkshireman who is buying director at Booths.
"We are conscious that customers are interested in where the food is from and how it is made, and many of them will know of the producer," adds Chris, who grew up in York and joined Booths in 1995 after selling his Vin Extraordinaire shops to Oddbins. For three years he was Booths' wine buyer, and then marketing director. He lives in the centre of Manchester and quips that he is doing missionary work in the Red Rose county.
Such regional prejudices are evident in the stores. Ilkley people prefer Wensleydale cheese to Lancashire. In Knutsford, they eat Cheshire. The Cumbrians favour their own meat. Yorkshire's bottled beer, such as Keighley's Timothy Taylor Landlord, crosses all boundaries and is popular in all the stores. Drinkers are spoilt for choice. Very few supermarkets can match the 150 or so bottled beers offered by Booths, nor the range of bespoke cider.
Another brand that sells throughout the stores is Bowland Milk. It comes from the eponymous, sparsely-populated region lying between Lancaster and the Yorkshire border, variously known as the Forest of Bowland and the Trough of Bowland. Much of it belongs to two great landowners, the Duke of Westminster and the Duchy of Lancaster (aka HM The Queen).
From this rather beautiful area, 15 dairy farmers supply Booths with milk products that are verging on organic, but are not certified as such. It is collected every day in a dedicated tanker. The idea was suggested by the farmers as a way of getting their milk to market in a short supply chain and being paid a price that recognised its premium quality.
The synergy is admirable. Booths is in direct contact with the food-makers and there is a mutually beneficial dialogue. The customer who may feel a resistance to the trampling of local shops by supermarkets has the consolation of supporting some local producers. Booths says that 25 per cent of its stock is produced locally. Examples: Morecambe Bay potted shrimp, saltmarsh-fed lamb from Holker, Hendersons Relish from Sheffield, Kolos bread and Mumtaz curries from Bradford, cheese from Wensleydale Creamery in Hawes, Masham's beers, and so forth. Also, in some promotional material Booths lists the farmers and small-scale producers in "Booths Country". In other words, it might not stock Jack Spratt's hand-stuffed sausages but it tells you where they are made and how to make contact.
Often the produce can be tasted immediately. A familiar sight and aroma outside some stores in summer was barbecued tasters: sausages on a stick, that sort of thing. In the run-up to Christmas, there were in-store tastings on Thursdays to Sundays. Examples: Wensleydale cheese and stollen cake, smoked duck and goat cheese tartlet, beetroot and smoked salmon blinis. Not enough for a meal, you'll understand, but enough to "put you on" and give inspiration to shop as you tour the store. The latest initiative is called By Request, which invites customers to order specialties. Examples: suckling pig porchetta, dressed crab, ribs of beef.
Booths size, or lack of it, allows this flexible approach. Its supermarkets are small by comparison. There is little risk of losing a member of the family among the aisles. Nor of Booths itself being headhunted by a giant.
Wal-Mart, the world's biggest retailer, which includes Leeds-based Asda, had 2004 third-quarter sales outside the US of £7.3bn, of which profits were £375.2m. Booths annual turnover is £190m and profits are £4.7m.
Artisan, at its new Kendal store, showcases what a tightly controlled family firm can do. It sells produce from specialist firms that do not have a supermarket outlet, a forerunner of a plan to have smaller Booths' shops selling products from a tighter radius. Mostly, Artisan sells this relatively local produce. Among them is Country Fare, from Kirkby Stephen, set up six years ago by eight wives of farmers to make natural preserves and baking.
As Diane Halliday, of Country Fare, points out, this local sourcing is going back in time, rather than forward. She likes the personal approach, and the minimal paperwork, leaving the wives "to get on with what we're good at – baking".
One of the few outsiders to break into Artisan is Steenbergs Organics, of Ripon. This bespoke herbs and spices wholesaler was set up in summer, 2003, by Axel and Sophie Steenberg. He had been a finance director in Leeds. She had been a charity fund-raiser in Harrogate.
Their new business fits Booths perfectly. Booths likes to meet its producers and merchants, and the Steenbergs, in turn, like to meet their suppliers.
They keep the linkage from the grower as short as possible, to ensure organic standards and fair trade, and they like to meet them, from the saffron farmer in Spain to the thyme and bay leaf grower in Turkey, to the cardamom picker in Sri Lanka. The latest line, pending an import licence, is vanilla from Madagascar.
One of their most popular spices is chilli, a whole range of them. Another is black pepper, which comes from Kerala. "It is graded. The larger the berry, the more intense the flavour," explains Axel Steenberg.
Just as exciting as Artisan the shop is Artisan the restaurant. The menu has been brought together by Stephen Doherty, previously head chef at the triple-Michelin-starred Le Gavroche, and since 1995 with his wife, Marjorie, running the Punch Bowl Inn at Crosthwaite, six miles to the west of Kendal.
His seasonal menus will call on chicken from Wastwater, Jennings beer from Cockermouth for the beef stews, bread from Kendal, and local cheese, Waberthwaite sausages, and so on.
Edwin Booth is chairman of the Preston-based business. He says: "Our support of regional suppliers gives us a strong point of difference from our competitors.
"Our customers provide positive feedback on our regional produce, as we are able to serve fresh groceries, excellent meats and regional delicacies at competitive prices."
frederic.manby@ypn.co.uk