We completed 25 years at Reeds on September, and decided it was time for a bit of a spruce-up.
When we arrived in 1985, we wanted to create a look and a logo. We chose British Racing Green, partly because we liked the colour, and partly because our competitors were using burgundy or blue. The black and gold shopfront became green and gold, and we had a logo that reflected a traditional hanging sign. It was an oval showing a pestle and mortar, historically associated with pharmacies, with the Reeds name above.
In those far-off days of the eighties, logos were created by designers in workshops rather like mediaeval monks in scriptoria. The lettering was rubbed on from large Letraset sheets, so we were limited to available typefaces, and the logo was drawn freehand by an artist. They then made a bromide (rather like a photographic slide) from which copies could be made. There were two difficulties with this - matching the colours was inexact (you'd be surprised what some printers thought British Racing Green was), and as the logo was enlarged it tended to blur.
Anyway, we finished up with this:
A quarter of a century later, we thought this looked a bit sombre and it needed recreating anyway. Having seen samples of their work, we asked Creative Direction in Walsingham Place to come up with some proposals for a new look.
Of course, there is more to that than just a new logo and colour scheme, but I'll save the rest to tease you. For now, we'll show off the logo we chose. Although we said we had a completely open mind about colours, we plumped for two shades of jade.
The pestle and mortar are still there (though drawn more realistically) but now they've been joined by a carboy. The lettering is more modern and the word "pharmacy" reminds people of what we do.
We're very pleased with it and you'll see it more often - embroidered on the new staff uniforms for a start, thanks to Alison and Monty next door to us at Keywear.
We would have done this whether we were moving or not, but it should help to give the new pharmacy a fresh look without breaking with our past.
The astute reader will note that there is something in this picture that would be an unusual feature in a pharmacy. The bar has been dismantled and has gone to a good home. This little photograph shows you a couple of the features that make this conversion challenging.
To the left of the hatch you can see a piece of the original pub wall. The Globe is a listed building and features like this have to be preserved. Most of the wall will be kept behind stud walling to allow an air gap but that particular section will be on view in the new dispensary.
Observe the ceiling beams. They butt up against the cross beam bearing The Globe's name. They don't pass through the beam yet there is a gap behind it over the bar area. In other words, those beams are purely decorative and don't support anything. To make that possible, there are rows of steel pillars out of shot to the right. The early days after our acquisition of The Globe were therefore spent in getting structural engineers (MBA, Chapel Hill, Truro) to do some difficult sums about the likelihood that the whole lot would remain standing if we could take a pillar or two away.
We also had surveyors from Sumo Services busily mapping where the drains go. It's always reassuring to know that you aren't discharging your sewage straight into the Leats running behind us.
Structural steelwork and drains aren't exciting, but the lack of them could be, so we're pleased to report that we have both.
That isn't "moving" as in emotional. It's "moving" as in starting off on one side of the road and ending up on the other.
Reeds has been at 10 Frances Street since Bert Reed came back from the war and set up his own business. Bert and Vi retired in May 1973, when Jim Catterall took over, and Gillian and Graham Brack came in September 1985, so we've been here over 25 years.
The pharmacy is cramped now, and the dispensary staff have very little room to move. It's also difficult to give people the privacy that we would like, though we have had a small consultation room for some time.
We tried to plan a refurbishment, but we came up against two problems. We can't move the outside walls, and there's a thick old granite wall across the middle of the shop that we can't move either. Whatever we do, we can't gain square footage.
When the chance to buy The Globe opposite us came up in May 2010, we started negotiating, and we completed the deal on 11th August, 2010. This blog looks at the process of turning a 19th century listed building from a pub into a pharmacy and coffee shop.
Hold on - a coffee shop?
There was a restaurant area in the pub, with a kitchen upstairs. It seemed a shame not to use them. There are lots of coffee shops in the city, but not many with good access for the disabled. Our customers have always liked the fact that we had chairs for them. Now they will be able to have a sit down and a cuppa in the same place.
Of course, we know nothing about running a coffee shop. We've visited plenty, but we have enough to do looking after people's health needs, so we had to find someone to run the coffee shop. But that's another story.
