A father of two who took over a city post office last year says he hopes it can become the 'best' in England.
Last September, city resident and father of two Adam Jackson embarked on a new adventure, taking over the post office on Earlham Road in Norwich.
Its previous owners, Martin and Beverley Baker, had been at the helm for almost three decades, so it was a tough act to follow.
But after a five-figure investment, full refurbishment and surviving the busy Christmas period, Adam says they’ve settled in.
“It’s been really lovely,” he says. “I think at first people were a bit sceptical – two young guys taking over from the old institution. I don’t think it did Great Britain any good losing both them and the Queen in the same month, as far as stability goes, [but] people have adapted to it now.”
He says that he and his business partner, Pete Tyson, have learned a lot over the past three months – including just how important post offices are to the communities they serve.
Citizens Advice published a paper last year, which explored the findings of a nationally representative survey of 2,000 individuals. It revealed that almost one in five people visit a post office every week and nearly half at least once a month.
Despite this, however, there have been sharp increases in the number of post offices temporarily closed.
Citizens Advice found that 1,291 post offices in Britain were ‘temporarily closed’ in September 2021, nearly twice as many as the 662 closed in September 2017. More than
eight in ten of those were closed for over a year.
The report said that older and disabled people, carers and people who don’t use the internet are disproportionately impacted by the closures – and that rural communities are some of the hardest hit.
One in three rural post offices now act as part-time outreaches and, on average, are only open for five and a half hours a week – yet they’re still among one of the top amenities people search for when buying a home.
Adam says that, even in the city, he’s seen how “imperative” post offices are. “People don’t realise how important they are to society until they go,” he says. And as more and more services move online, he says the organisation works to fill in the gaps.
At Earlham House Post Office, Adam says they offer 170 different services, including crucial services for most of the high street banks.
“You can get cash out and put checks in and everything for all the different banks at the post office, which not many people know. The post office has said everyone’s going cashless except a few people who fall between the gaps, and that’s really important because they tend to be poor or more vulnerable.”
The post office is also the “last place” people can go if they can’t pay their bills or council tax online, Adam says – as well as sending something to somewhere as far afield as Antarctica. “You can send something the size of an advent calendar to Antarctica for £4.20 with the delivery aim of six days,” he laughs. “That’s ridiculous!”
Since taking over the post office, Adam says he’s been struck by the real sense of community in this part of Norwich, which he describes as like a “medieval village.”
Before they opened, back in September, he says neighbours were lending them tape measures and even teaching them how to lay the floor, to save on costs. Now he’s noticed that the surrounding area is seeing a bit of a resurgence, too.
“I’m not saying we’re responsible for this but the culture of the whole area feels like it’s on an upward trend,” he says. In fact, he likens it to broken windows theory, an idea published by political scientists and crimonologists James Q Wilson and George L Kelling
in The Atlantic Monthly in 1982.
The theory is predicated on the idea that if a window in a building is broken and left unrepaired, more windows are likely to get broken because it signals that no-one cares. As a result, the building is likely to attract further vandalism, like litter and graffiti. Adam says his experience at Earlham House is very much the opposite.
“You encourage the people around you, you’re smiley despite them having a bad day or despite it raining and you invest in a place,” he explains. “You’re saying ‘I love this place and this place is precious to me’ and then other people [say] ‘this is a valuable, nice place and I’m going to come here more often’ and then they get involved and start their own businesses and send their kids to school there.
“People, when they see you caring, they care as well.”
Adam also runs Treehouse Festival, a week-long event where people can have a go at traditional crafts that otherwise might die out. It encourages younger people to try their hands at things like glass-blowing and blacksmithing, calligraphy or bookbinding – and now he’s bringing a bit of that to Earlham Road, too.
He and his team have set up three bays by the entrance to the shop so that traditional craftspeople within a 15 mile radius can sell their wares. “They keep the majority of the money, and that’s kind of our way of encouraging and giving back and it does attract people into the shop.”
The shop is well-stocked with cards and gifts and many of them are also plastic-free.
Adam says there are currently 115 post offices in Norfolk and, so far, Earlham House is one of the busiest. Online reviews, many of which are five-star, are positive, praising the staff for their friendliness and patience.
In many ways, Adam says Earlham House Post Office is redefining what a post office can be – but he’s quick to point out that it wouldn’t have been so successful if it hadn’t been for the team.
“We’ve happened upon some really awesome staff who have just been wonderful,” he says. “We’re really big on setting the culture and providing a place that’s happy and generous with time and that’s really reflected for the customers it seems. People seem really happy.
“In a way, we’re doing things old school. We don’t have some development company who is guiding this. We’re just two local guys who wanted to have a go at something. And in the end, it is going well. We’re finding [that] it’s becoming sustainable.
“The thing I want to make sure we’re known for is being really reliable insofar as we are open every single second that we say we are,” he says. “I think that’s really valuable to people.”
His other main objective, Adam says, is to make Earlham House Post Office the best in England.
“There are actually awards for that, believe it or not!”
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