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MHG41221 - 17 High Street - Rosemarkie

Summary

Shop in front of and below private house

Type and Period (1)

Protected Status

Full Description

15 High Street (private house)
The Bakery –George McFarlane (Slater’s 1911) shop and bake house in the rear – all equipment still on site. George McFarlane was a baker and confectioner employing his wife, Elizabeth, Donald Macdonald , journeyman baker and James Fraser, apprentice baker. George McFarlane went bankrupt in 1915. M. MacGillivray took over in the 1930s. <1>

By 1950 there were only four shops along Rosemarkie High Street. There were two grocers still, Daniel Fraser, Grocery and Ironmongery at 18 High Street and Lewis Grant opposite at number 17. Lewis Grant ran a traditional grocery, buying in fresh rabbit meat from schoolboy, Mark Grigor, who caught the rabbits on his father’s farm before going onto school. It was a bright cheerful shop with a modern extension but it was proving ever more difficult for village shops to meet their customers’ needs. Grant’s had modernised by delivering their customer’s groceries by van rather than by bicycle.

The changing nature of the village population with more and more people travelling to work and shop in town since the opening of the Kessock Bridge in 1982, means that while the local shop continues to be essential for those without transport, like the elderly, for the majority of the inhabitants, the village shop may be used only for items which have been ‘forgotten’ in the main weekly shop at the supermarket. By 1985 Grant’s premises had been taken over by Macdonald’s of Avoch, Bakery. The shop was not just an outlet for the bakery but continued to sell a range of grocery goods using the services of the SPAR voluntary wholesaling group. These wholesaling groups promote recognised brands and give the independent grocer the benefits of better purchasing power as well as allowing participation in marketing initiatives.

In Rosemarkie it was this grocery shop that was to take the next big step to modernisation. In 1993 the new owners, Mr and Mrs Phillips, who still live in the village, introduced ‘self- service’. When Mr and Mrs Phillips bought the SPAR. they were anxious to preserve as much as possible of the original shop while at the same time bringing it up to date. Inside the shop the wooden cladding on the walls and the wooden shelves could remain but the counter across the middle had to go to allow for self-service. When the Grants lived above the shop, customers were accustomed to knock on the door for service if the shop was shut. As the Phillips lived several doors away this was not convenient but to maintain the level of service Mr Phillips would open up on Christmas morning while Mrs Phillips was at home cooking Christmas dinner. That two hour period had the highest footfall of the year as |Mr Phillips was kept busy supplying the batteries needed for the new toys the children were desperate to play with or the cigarettes for the adults. <2>

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Map

Location

Grid reference	Centred NH 7364 5761 (14m by 11m) (2 map features)
Map sheet	NH75NW
Geographical Area	ROSS AND CROMARTY
Civil Parish	ROSEMARKIE

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