I joined the store in 1951. I was a lad on the retail stationery department. Fetch and carry type of bloke and one of the things I had to do initially was the marking of the birthday and Christmas cards. And you can imagine what that was like at Christmas time. This was governed by the Social Stationary buyer Miss Garrod. A bit of a terror. she was particular in her marking. There was a time when I juts marked up a gross of Christmas cards and she came up - Oh that's most untidy, rub them out and do them again. So I had to rub them out and do them all again. That was my initiation into Stationery at Jarrolds at any rate,
Eventually I went onto commercial Stationer department which sells commercial stationery and office equipment - I was just a lad there. Serving on the counter, meeting all the customers and from there I became a rep. One of the customers was City Hall. I did nothing but City Hall contact and Jarrolds had a pretty good relationship with the City Hall in general. It was necessary for me to go round after the Town Clerk's office for my daily order and to sort out any problems that might have arisen out of the various departments. That's the way it was.
From there I was repping and after one of the other of the reps left I had half the city as my domain. And after that I did County, which was fairly wide - Norfolk, Suffolk and parts of Cambridgeshire. When I was doing the County - as well call it - it was continuous, a lot of miles. But it was something I enjoyed. I've been a rep all my life now. I always enjoyed driving.
It was a good old family firm, you could talk to anyone, right to the top and get a satisfactory answer which would have a lot of meaning. It wasn't ruled by (Russles) shall we say and those stupid regulations we get nowadays. It was humane. They help you sort out any problems you had and you always came out feeling someone had listened to you in a way, sometime I regret leaving. But it was one of those things. I saw a future elsewhere so reluctantly I left. But I was quite happy there and would have been happy now.
In the later part Young Mr Richard Jarrold came in and he'd got modern ideas and went along with modern thinking and obviously the business increased.
Commercial stationery that I was in at the time obviously increased pro rata with the rest of the store. Plus the fact that we had two other reps. I believe - I can't remember know, but we were all fighting for business, we had targets to meet and thing like that. There was general competition between the reps, and the staff in general, I suppose to try and do their best. And it was rewarded in the normal way. I've always been competitive when I play bowls or whatever it is I play to win.
My initial training in retail stationery and guidance by Miss Garrod in the way to do things properly obviously helped. And wherever you went in the store there was guidance if you were prepared to listen. Sometimes I wasn't you know as I'm a bit stubborn. It paid off in the end though.
In my early days when I was just a lad I would help out wherever I could. Whether it was going downstairs to pack a parcel as they were so busy down there and my boss wanted it done immediately. Then I went down to see Bob Sargent and said look Bob can this go immediately as he said no you'll have to pack it yourself, well than I packed it myself as good as that. And if I wanted something from the educational Department was education were dealing with a lot of Schools so they had stock we needed and vice versa, there's a lot of transferring one way to the other. It was good fun anywhere. You could go anywhere in the store and be known and know the people who were there. It was a good friendly family store as I said.
Our department for part of the time we had a bowls team and Jarrolds built us a bowls green up at Fifers lane where they built the sports ground. The included the bowling green. I had many happy years bowling with them, We used to go out on trips and there was the annual dinner dance with the factory, which If I remember rightly was held at the Samson Hercules Hotel. We had car rallies and what not.
Whist drives and crib drives used to have in the top floor. Very nice evenings, Nice and social and that was both factory and shop, although it was mainly shop that attended. Quite good.
I was on holiday with my friend in retail stationery. We cam back from holiday and I went up to educational department and saw her. I went down and saw my boss's secretary and said to her - who is the new girl in Education department and I made a point of meeting her and then we dated. Her father was in electrician up at the speedway so out first dates was up at the speedway were he could keep an eye on her or me. I hall never forget it cos we sat on the rail and both fell over backwards,. From then on we started courting and married in 1960. The first boy was born in '64, the second in '66 and the wife left work in '61.
Working for Jarrolds did give you an edge in the city. Originally, yes Jarrolds was the name in the city and everybody knew it But competition increase and the mechanisation of office machinery increased - well you had to have more specialised people coming into it. Consequently you were fighting all the while. Originally Jarrolds was a synonymous name in the city.
It was and still is a good old family store and the training, although it wasn't obligatory in those days, came from the any of the various departments, They taught you that the customer was always right even if they weren't and you had to grin and bear it. But if you had a grievance you could always talk to somebody about it.
But politeness, civility and helpfulness was they main motto I think, They used to carry it out. It unlike today when you go into a store and if you want to find something, you have to stop young ladies who were gassing away or doing their finger nails and you go to break them up somehow and they ignore you, until you can get any service. Even this afternoon we asked for directions for getting out of Chapelfield car park and the first attendant we asked didn't know. He pointed me out to another security man who did give is good directions. But that's the sort of thing, they employ people who don't know what they are doing and just ring up the tills. Whereas before the customer asked for information. You gave them that information and you told them what was best for them, in case they were wrong. But as often or not the had to be right and you served them with what wanted which was best for them - not just what they asked for.
The other memory I can remember is walking behind the retail stationery counter,. I had been to the stock room and got pint bottles on ink, I had two in each hand and it was my job to fill the shelved you each day. And first thing in the morning that was my job. And these two pint bottles of ink in my hand and I walked down the aisle between the shelves and the drawers and the counter on the right hand side. Somebody had left a drawer partially opened took the bottom out of bottle of red ink, Can you imagine the mess, I shall never forget that one, Was I in for the high jump, but I didn't really jump too high as the manager was very sympathetic at the time, When he looked at my shoes and socks and trousers he was very sympathetic. But I cursed the person who left the drawer open.
Change mostly happened in my latter days. Mostly I remember the (Cooldax Verifax photocopier). We had to put a sensitised she over a layer of (bowver) with your original copy, expose it then you out it together with another sheet in a warm liquid bath Then you had to pull it apart, squeeze it. You had to hold it for about 30 seconds then peel it apart to get one copy.
Commercial side we took on the Polaroid Camera when that first came out. That was almost a similar of thing. You had sensitised cassettes in the cameras 0 took a picture, pulled it out, wait so long then pulled them apart.
Eventually the cam out in colour of course. Phillips pocket meme 9 there really pocket but Phillips bought out a small one, not that much larger that today. I cant really think of anything else that came up as modern, when I left them, advancement you know. Well there's no comparison is there. The good old days.
I enjoyed most some of the outings, coach trips and what not, But one the most relaxing, the most fun was out lunchtime game of cards, I know Alan Hutson, Reg Moore, there was the under manger in the hardware - I can't remember his name.
But we used to have sessions up there. If there only four of us we played Crib and otherwise we played pontoon,. An in those days, unlike now, my memory was quite good for the sequence of a pack of cards, so I used to do fairly well at pontoon till we lost the bank and had to shuffle them. That was enjoyable.
Obviously the dinner dances at the Samson went down very well. But the general camaraderie of the staff was very good, particularly in the early days.
I worked 9 - 5.30. I know I had to catch a bus at Horning to get there and I had to leave dead on 5.30 to get the quarter to 5 bus back. When I got on the move it was much easier, kept my bike down the tavern just below Exchange Street so it was handy. I used to pay him half a crown a week.
I first started on 32 shillings and sixpenny e a week. I did alright.
Originally it was my head master that at CNS, Mr Jackson, put me in touch with Jarrolds. He suggested I tried them which I did, Eventually after that I found a cousin, Jo Anderson who worked there. One time he was my boss on commercial Stationery.
I used to go the Corn Hall to see the wrestling fortnightly. The wife and I and Reg More. I left at 5.30 plant Janet in the Corn Hall steps and he and I would go round to the Clove Leaf café on Dove Street and get sandwiches and rolls and whatnot. Then go back and be the first in the door. It was a big open space with the ring in the middle and all the corn stands where the market prior.
We'd grab a form chuck it up over the back stands. Being short people we needed it then we could look down on the ring which was absolutely brilliant. We used to have really good nights. Wed come out at 10.30 and Janet would dash in one direction for her bus and I would dash in the other. That was great. The Corn Hall is gone now isn't it. Next door they had a little shop called (Vanstones), it was between the corn hall and Jarrolds and that's where Commercial Stationery used to keep the office machinery and whatnot.
Our local wrestler was Eric Pleasant and he wrestled under the name of Panther. Eric lived out at Wyndham but he used to wrestle up here occasion. We were every close. He taught me judo and then we were always friends. Both the wife and I did Judo and Aikido, We had very good relations with Eric and his wife Pauline, We had some good Judo weekends.
