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Celebrating the many women of New Covent Garden Market

Celebrating the many women of New Covent Garden Market

As we celebrate International Women's Day (IWD) on Friday 8 March, we meet some of the many women who call New Covent Garden Market home.

The annual event - always held on 8 March each year - is a great excuse for us to celebrate every single woman who works at New Covent Garden Market. Wholesale markets the world over have undeniably been male-dominated environments throughout history, however, in recent years, we've seen a steady increase in the number of women who work here, in various roles and positions.

This year's IWD theme is “Inspire Inclusion.” It envisions a world that is free from bias, stereotypes, and discrimination - a world where diversity is celebrated and difference is valued.

Below we showcase just a handful of the many woman based at the market. We can't show you them all here, but we do know the market is better for them, would not be as successful without them and we'd love to welcome many more females into our community.

Above: Fiona Christensen has been a Sales Associate at Flower Market wholesaler Green and Bloom for the past two years.

Above: Mo Sato-Rain has been a Sales Associate at Flower Market wholesaler R French & Son for the past three years.

Above: Frankie Spivey, owner of Frankie's Brownies, one of the many SME businesses based at Mission Kitchen, the shared-kitchen workspace based at the market's Food Exchange building.

Above: Cassandra Liu, co-owner of CHA-DONG, another example of a successful SME businesses based at the market-based Mission Kitchen.

Above: Mary Brunning has been Stand Manager at Fruit and Vegetable Market business Neil Brown Herbs for the past five years.

If you're interested in working here, pop down to the market and talk to some of the traders - there are always opportunities. Or get in touch with traders directly - you'll find contact details via our Wholesalers' Directory here: Find a Wholesaler - New Covent Garden Market.

When Mick Reid made the short journey from Kennington Cross to start work in New Covent Garden Flower Market in late 1974, he was embarking on what is, to date, a 49-year relationship with what was then a brand-new market.

"Kennington Cross used to be railway sidings and they were my stomping ground as a kid. I had been doing an apprenticeship to become an electrician and earning £9 a week (and giving my mum £7!), while all my mates on the building sites were taking home £100 plus. So, I worked in a bar to earn money, was missing college and getting behind and the next thing you know the job came up here.

I started working for Covent Garden Market Authority, on the pitching gang, bringing the product into the market for the wholesalers. There were 14 of us and I had to do two months of training on the low-loading trucks, so officially I started in February, 1975. I did my forklift training too and there were only two of us who could drive them, so we were in demand. It wasn’t easy as there was a bank outside the market and in bad weather if you hit a bit of foliage you could be sliding down it!

It was important to get in and get to know people as, like lots of places, if your nose don’t fit...

I was on there for 13 years and became the longest serving member and foreman. But the pitching gang was dwindling in numbers as other people started to do its work. I was on a low basic wage – you earnt money by collecting boxes or water for people. I couldn’t earn enough money to get a mortgage, so I became a fully-fledged porter and first I was night man, working for a lovely guy, Gordon at Pratley’s.

I thought I’d step in and find it easy, but I found the transition really hard, as there were so many porters and all the good 'turns' had gone to the regulars. So you had to run your nuts off to get new people and build your turns up that way. Gordon always wanted me to make more money from my turns as he knew that would encourage me to work harder for him, which it did. I was always happy to put myself out for others as it got you more work. Some of the younger kids even then didn’t want to do it and the older boys found it hard to adapt to a new market and new systems, but that worked for me as people kept coming back.

I moved around a bit in the early days as a porter - with a young family, you’d chase the money and it wasn’t too big a deal for the firms in those days. There were 76 porters getting a right good living; now there’s maybe three or four.

I did settle down though and was with SR Allan for 22 years. When they made me redundant, my world came to an end. It was all I knew and even though I started doing deliveries, I wanted to be here. I’d known Dave, the guvnor at DG Flowers, since he was working in the office at 14. I was lost and missed the friendship and camaraderie. DG had got really big so I asked Dave if he could use me for anything and he said ‘yeah, that’s fine’.

That was a few years ago. I get in at 10pm and put together the orders for customers in the West End – you’ve got to deck it, put it on the floor and into the annex so when the guys come in, they know that it’s all sorted for them. We trust each other. Dave knows everything will be spot on when he picks up an invoice and he has a head start over other companies, who come in later and look through stuff.

Sometimes I’ll finish work at 3, but still be here at 5 – there’s always something to be done and I won’t go home until I’m finished. It all helps the firm tick. The time for a cup of tea and a chat is at the end of the day. Young kids coming in now find it strange, they don’t want to get up in the morning and they want a social life. Work in the market and you don’t really have a social life, you basically have one day off and that’s to recover!

I haven’t been too well lately and the market has been very supportive. I had 28 years without a day off and I was ever so proud of that. When I didn’t come in one day, they couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t get out of bed!

I suppose it’s like Marmite – you love it or you don’t. To me it is a way of life. I loved the atmosphere from day one, it was a buzz. When it was busy, it was still friendly and everyone helped each other out. It was different gravy. I’m 69 now and I can’t imagine not being here."

The seasons are shifting with spring produce now flowing into the Market.

Peas and broad beans are from the Continent right now but British is to come.

peas and broad beans

The first English asparagus is available but the season will start in earnest in April. White and wild asparagus from France and Italy also available.

English asparagus

English forced rhubarb is still here but will be edged out by the outdoor crop as the weather warms up.

English forced rhubarb

Blood oranges are still plentiful - mainly Tarocco variety. Other citrus includes Nardicotts, the late season easy peeler, clementines, mandarins and pomelos.

blood oranges

UK apples and pears are still available out of store. Other pear varieties include Williams from Italy and French Passe Crassane.

March is a good month for lychees, mangoes and pomegranates.

Lychees

Gariguette and Frais de Bois strawberries are available from France and Spain.

On the veg front, there is a wide choice of artichoke varieties - Petit Violet, Calico, spikey etc.

Brassicas are still in fine form - Savoy cabbages are especially good in March.

Petit Violet artichokes

This month you will also start to see the first of the greenhouse-grown tomatoes. Below are some winter varieties, which are more savoury in flavour with a crunchy texture.

Winter tomatoes

From the sunny south of Europe, courgettes include round and Tromboncino.

Round courgettes

Other vegetables in season include beetroot, celeriac, wet garlic, agretti, puntarelle, cime di rapa and the radicchios.

For mushrooms, morels are still from China.

Morel mushrooms

See you in April for the next Market Report and a full celebration of English asparagus.

Bryan Porter was part of the fourth generation to run his family’s eponymous foliage business in the Market. The Flower Market was in his blood long before he started working here in 1990. He tells Market Times the story of the company now known simply as Porters Foliage and looks at the current state of play

Let’s start where it all began – how did the Porters get into this trade?

In the early twentieth century, my great grandfather, Aaron Porter, was a feather collector, delivering into London from Sussex. One morning, he saw the activity in the old Covent Garden, went and had a look and discovered they were selling some cut foliage. He thought ‘there’s some of that near me’ and after a few conversations, began selling foliage to the traders at the market. From those beginnings, he decided to take a stand in 1910, first selling his own produce and then selling product supplied to him by other people.

The business began as Aaron Porter & Sons and at its peak, he had five shops in the market. The flower market was relatively small and they were selling from properties around Covent Garden, not in the main square, which was where the fruit and veg traders operated.

One of the Porters units at the old market

He had five sons working in the business, including my grandfather Ronald, and when Aaron died in 1948, he left a flourishing business. If I’m honest, my grandfather’s brothers were more interested in reaping the benefits of their father’s hard graft and spent all the money and lived the life! My grandfather, on the other hand, knuckled down to running the business and then went off on his own in the early ‘60s, creating Ronald Porter & Sons. Unfortunately, he died in his early 50s, in 1966, which is when my dad Brian and uncle Charlie took it on.

I’ve been in the market for 33 years now. As a child, I was always at the market and though I was very young, I do have memories of the old Covent Garden, sliding down the chutes into the cellars! Coming to this market, everything felt very space age – automatic opening doors was like being a spaceship to me at that age!

I always enjoyed being in and around the market and of course, it is in my blood, but my mum always pushed us away from the market. She gave us the best education she could because she knew what a hard life it is and the sacrifices involved. I went off and did motor vehicle engineering and worked in a dealership as a management trainee for while, but I was still living at home and one Christmas, I could see how busy my father was and went to give them a hand. That was it, once you’re in, you’re in.

Dad and Charlie ran the business until about a decade ago, before retiring and happily, they are both still with us. I loved working with him and my uncle. It was also a very good time in the economy and the market was a magical place to be – it always had a buzz and was great fun. As the industry has moved on, the market has changed and some of that fun and enjoyment has dwindled. It’s not gone altogether, but it’s harder work.

My older brother Barry had come into the business when he was 16 and I came in when I was 21 and we then ran the business for a few years and changed the name again to Porters Foliage, before he took a different direction and I bought him out.

My father encouraged me and my brother to do our own thing – he was very good at pushing us to make that effort. Big changes needed to be made to the way we sourced our product – the world had shrunk, it became easier to import and access new suppliers and I had started to travel and look for new suppliers around the world.

We found new sources in South Africa, to broaden our range of proteas and that type of produce, as well as South America and Australia. It is our diversity and ability to directly source items that aren’t likely to come through the Dutch auctions that gives us our USP. We were flying in from eight sources around the world before Covid, but it changed everything. It was devastating to the whole industry of course, but some wholesalers were affected more than others. For us it was very difficult because we didn’t have an online buying option at the time and that link into our suppliers and customers.

Our online portal opened us up to a potential new client base and raised our profile outside of the market. It’s another challenge; running an online element of your business is time consuming and has a cost attached, but the new generation coming through need the option of having things at the touch of a button and we recognise that. It is still a relatively small part of our business, but momentum is growing and we saw much bigger uptake of online sales during Christmas.

Where do you think New Covent Garden Flower Market is right now?

This market is taking stock of where we all are. The after-effects of Covid are still being felt. We got through it by borrowing money, but now we have to earn money to repay it.

Coming into the first quarter of 2023, for instance, we had had an OK Christmas ‘22 and we were looking forward to a steady year, nothing spectacular. Then, for mainly economic reasons, things just dropped off a cliff and we weren’t ready for that. The summer was steady and the last quarter was a bit better, but for my business, the last quarter is the most important period of the year by far, so if we’re quiet then, we are definitely in trouble.

Covid changed London and the way in which our industry supplies customers. Of the customer base we would have supplied pre-Covid, I’d say 10% didn’t make it through, while another 30-40% are still in business, but have removed their bricks and mortar retail element. They are working through webshops and on the telephone, but not face-to-face so much, which has a huge effect on the market.

People have placed a higher value on their time and are running their businesses with fewer staff and less resources. So, for some, coming to the market has become a question of time, simple as that. A lot of customers are buying to order, exactly what they need rather than speculating to sell onto a third party. Some are not coming to market as much as they would have, but even when they do, the purchases tend to be lower volume than they would have been prior to Covid.

The cost of transport, energy and documentation has also risen tremendously in the last three years, which has a compounding effect on the cost of the produce we sell here, so the price-point has become more expensive; undoubtedly too expensive for some.

That is our biggest challenge. We have broadened our horizons to attract customers that we may not have tapped into before. Moving forward though, we need to create more turnover, more volume, in order to sustain the market as a long-term viable proposition. I think there’s ability to expand. The key is adapting to the marketplace and the new breed of customer, which has a fresh outlook, as well as fresh ideas and expectations. They will work in a different way to traditional florists and we have to find our way to move with the evolution of the industry and work in a more flexible way.

Why does this Market remain as relevant to London’s floristry scene as ever?

Our aim is to inspire, that’s what we’re here for. Some of the most creative people in the country are our customers and when they come onto our stand, we have to inspire them to create something they weren’t going to create when they walked in.

There are secondary wholesalers around London that can offer a good service and a high percentage of what’s on offer in New Covent Garden. For some people that’s enough to get them through, but they will not get what they can get here.

I think the people who visit the market are inspired. Buying online is OK when you know what you’re buying, but the sensory side of it is still very important. We still have a unique offering – there is nowhere else where you can find the range and diversity we have at New Covent Garden Flower Market.

The key with our products is that it is very much a visual and sensory experience. You can’t smell a flower online or appreciate the texture of foliage online. You need to see it for yourself, smell it and touch it. You need to see two items side by side to know how they would physically work together, or whether you need to switch out and change for a different product. That sort of facility is still hugely important to many florists, who want to mix and match.

You now have a fifth generation of Porters in the fold, including your son, Sam...

Bryan with Sam, right, and Josh Souter

Sam is 21 and along with his cousin Aaron, who’s name of course harks back to Porter’s founding father, he is indeed the fifth generation of the family in the business.

Sam has been with the business three years now and Bryan thoroughly enjoys working with him. “Working with my son is a great experience. It’s lovely to have your family around you, to enjoy the time together and most of all it’s lovely to see them all develop as young adults, both in business and their understanding of life.

If you asked Sam if he saw himself working here, he’d say no, probably not, he came here by default and was given opportunities to do other things. But he is pretty laid back and was given the ultimatum that if he didn’t find something else, he’d have to come and work here until he did! He definitely enjoys the job, the market and the people. Does he enjoy the working hours and the routine – no, but that’s the challenge for everyone who works here. He’s still young, so we’ll see if this is his job for life or not. His life and his skills will develop and there is loads of scope for that to happen here.

Hopefully the team here will master how to run a business without me, as I won’t be here forever!

Finally Bryan, what does New Covent Garden Market mean to you?

For me, the market has always been part of my life and I want it so succeed and for everyone here to stick together. The strength of the market is made up by the combination of individual businesses, and it is that mixture that gives the market its uniqueness, its feel and its offer – as a collective we are much stronger.

Garden Of Eva was a founding member of Mission Kitchen (MK) at New Covent Garden Market in 2021. We caught up with Eva Thorne and discovered that her journey epitomises what the commercial kitchen space and added-value membership benefits at MK are designed for.

“I grew up with a mother from the American South who was really into the region’s culinary traditions, so from the time I was young, I was making pickles, jams, and relishes and since 2012, I’d been dreaming of starting my own condiments company,” says Eva. “My dream was fuelled by memories of mommy’s sweet and tangy cinnamon-spiced pickled watermelon rind that she served at our holiday dinner parties, as an accompaniment to ham and turkey. They disappeared fast!”

She had travelled the world over as a food lover, but the Ureka! moment happened at home in the US. “I was sitting in the parking lot of a pan-Asian supermarket in Boston, waiting for it to open because I needed to buy unwaxed lemons to preserve for a Moroccan tagine that I was obsessed with making. You couldn’t find Moroccan preserved lemons in any store back then, so I had to do it myself. In that parking lot, memories of my experiences making pickles, jams and relishes with my mom, dad, and sister collided with needing unwaxed lemons for a tagine. I thought, ‘you know what?; there’s something in this, a demand for pickles from all over the world’,” Eva says. “It seemed to me that the best place to start would be with what I already knew – pickles, jams and relishes from the American South.

“I decided that the first product line would be pickles, starting with pickled watermelon rind (yes, the rind - no waste) and chow chow (pickled relish with cabbage, tomatoes, red and green bell peppers, onions, vinegar, sugar, and warm spices). Both the pickle and the relish go great with cheese, which Brits love. The pickled watermelon rind is a good accompaniment to ham, bbq, venison, and duck. It also goes well chopped and added to tuna and pasta salads. Think of chow chow as a distant cousin of piccalilli. It’s good with everything: veggies, pinto beans, hot dogs and sausages, and burgers. I have customers who eat it with eggs, roasted salmon, and roasted chicken,” she says.

The vision was crystalised on arrival in England, in 2014, when Eva realised she still couldn’t find any of the pickles and relishes she grew up with and recognised a similar gap in the UK market. Busy with her own career though, Eva was short of the time needed to make solid progress – until the pandemic hit and she decided to use the window provided by lockdown to spread her wings.

“As part of the pre-opening work conducted by MK, Amy Win, the organisation’s Community Manager, had put together an amazing online course called Launch Your Food Hustle,” says Eva. “During the autumn and winter lockdown in 2020/21, I applied and was accepted. I had been to plenty of ‘Ra-Ra, you can do it’ types of founder bootcamps and while they were inspiring, I always found that I left without a clear direction – do this, then do this, then do that etc… What was I supposed to actually do to create a business? I didn’t get that.”

“The course Amy offered was revolutionary for me, because every week, I had something new and concrete to do – a social media plan, a kitchen operations plan, a spreadsheet for all of my ingredients (to figure out my costs), recipes written out, feedback from testing the recipes, who to talk to in order to open up a website or to get insurance. So by the time I’d finished the course, all I actually had to do was register my business and buy my insurance and I had exactly what I needed to launch. |”

“It changed everything for me - I call her Momma Amy now!”

Eva’s dream became a reality when she incorporated Garden of Eva in May, 2021. She became a founding member of MK. “I’m a proud founding member,” Eva says. “I started making pickles and relish at MK and went up to four days a week, after work, from 6pm-10pm – for several months.”

Just two and a half years later, Garden of Eva is the perfect example of what MK aims to achieve for its members. It is an ‘incubator’, supporting and enriching newborn food businesses until they have grown in strength and size and can fly the nest to bigger and, hopefully, great things. “I went to MK’s events and joined its brilliant mentoring program,” Eva says. “The program features successful industry insiders and at an event featuring new businesses, a co-founder of Honest Burgers (HB), Tom Barton, tried my chow chow over Southern greens and cornbread that I made. He loved it, offered to be my mentor, and suggested a collaboration. That meant featuring Garden of Eva’s American Southern Chow Chow on an HB special burger of the month.

“The chow chow was served at all 42 HB restaurants across the UK. It took 10 months to find a manufacturer, scale, get the branding, etc… But the hard work, exhaustion and frustration paid off. HB created a Southern, buttermilk-brined fried chicken burger with lettuce, cheese, candied bacon, ranch mayo, hot sauce, and GOE’s American Southern Chow Chow.”

Eva supplies a wide range of customers, but charts her higher-profile progress since that initial breakthrough: “The collaboration with HB was in summer 2022 and things have moved on quickly since then,” she says. “I launched American Southern Chow Chow, Pickled Watermelon Rind and Chili-Watermelon Jam in Whole Foods Market UK  in the summer of 2023 and there’s another major store that I will be launching in early in 2024. There are a few online retailers that should be stocking our products soon, too.”

The commercial success has been accompanied by awards and high-profile recognition. Eva’s pickles won 2 stars at Great Taste Awards in 2022 and Whole Foods Market UK recently named her Chili-watermelon jam in their list of 2024 food and drink trends for “complex heat”.

The rapid expansion began from Nine Elms, but Eva’s business soon outgrew the MK facility. That hasn’t signalled the end of her membership though. “I don’t cook at MK any more because I’ve outsourced production to a manufacturer in Wales, but I’m still a member because I can come in and do development work, make a couple of jars for something specific or do some food photography, for example. I love being part of the community; people get what you’re doing and they’re really supportive. When you need someone to taste something – does it need more thyme, more salt, less cheese… – or just help you put the lids on your jars, that’s always there for you. They’re my people.

“I can’t imagine not being involved in MK now,” she says. “I think it’s been great in terms of learning, but also they are really beginning to emerge as the go-to place for new food businesses. They are helping lots of emerging food brands to launch and grow and also, through their events, they are convening some of the really important conversations about the direction of food, whether that be in the context of climate change or what he future of fat will be. They are helping to change the way people think about food and that’s hugely important.”

Eva winning with Amy and MK

Amy Win, Community Manager at Mission Kitchen, recounts her experience of working with Garden of Eva:

“As Eva says, we first met online as part of MK's Launch Your Food Hustle course, which was entirely delivered on Zoom during the peak days of Covid. It took very early-stage food founders through the building blocks of a food business. As the course instructor, I was intrigued by Eva's business proposition and impressed with her natural storytelling style and warmth (yes even via Zoom!).

“Eva ended up winning discounted MK membership and joining us as a founding member when we opened our doors in June 2021. Since then, her business has gone from strength to strength. She's secured a contract manufacturer, been mentored by food industry veterans such as Tom Barton and Pollen + Grace co-founder Kristina Komlosiova, as well as receiving Great Taste Awards.

“It's been rewarding to see Eva move through the various stages of her business over the last couple of years. She's made the most of what MK tries to foster: the network, community, and expert links.

That Garden of Eva’s products are now found in WholeFoods is an amazing achievement for a first-time food entrepreneur, and although she has devoted much more of her time to her own business recently, Eva is still holding down a job in a completely different industry.

“Safe to say Eva is a powerhouse and I've loved working with her and keeping in touch with her during her food business journey.”

Instagram - @gardenofeva.uk

Website - gardenofeva.co.uk

Pinterest - @EvaPickles

Jim Dew, who owns and runs Harwoods of London, has not always been based in Nine Elms. The business relocated from East London in 2010, to be closer to its customer base and take advantage of the extensive high-quality product offer on buyers’ walk. The firm had long been acquainted with this Market though and we asked Jim to tell us about his relationship with NCGM

“In the early ‘90s, we used to come to New Covent Garden Market as a company, even though we were based in Bow, a couple of miles from New Spitalfields Market,” Jim says. “We would buy most of our stuff then from Spitalfields, but either my dad or myself would come over in the lorry to Nine Elms every night and buy the products we couldn’t get over there.

“We’d visit Roux Lamartine, when Tim who now runs European Salads was working there, and buy all the French salads, products like oakleaf, frisee, even French bunched herbs in those days. When Roux Lamartine went, Paris Express came along and we also used to buy French salads from them. We’d get all the posh mushrooms, the Girolles and what have you, from Mushroom Man - I think we were their first customer; when they were Fruits of the Forest in Garratt Lane, they used to deliver to us in Bow).”

Jim and his dad (also Jim) would take the product from New Covent Garden back and sell it to the caterers in Spitalfields, companies like RA Prescott, which is now Prescott Thomas, and Nelson Bros – as well as their own network of catering customers, he says. “They used to help us,” Jim remembers. “Spitalfields wouldn’t open ‘til 3am and we’d have a Nelson Bros sticker on the side of the lorry so we could drive past the queue and get into the market early.

“We also used to drop product over to NCGM from Spitalfields. So even before we were a tenant at this Market, we were doing our bit.”

A wider range of the products he needed for his customers may have been an initial draw, but Jim says that when Harwoods eventually decided to relocate to Nine Elms, emissions was the tipping point. “We were running a lorry from Bow Triangle Business Centre to Spitalfields Market, about a two-and-a-bit mile trip, and to buy a brand-spanking new lorry for five miles a day just didn’t make sense. Neither did running back and forwards in three vans,” he explains. “We had already decided we needed to be over here because of the clientele we had – no disrespect at all to Spitalfields but it didn’t have what Covent Garden had in terms of the lovely exotic gear, the French salads and mushrooms and our customers all wanted that.

“It hasn’t changed our business as such. We had almost exactly the same customer profile as we do now, restaurants and all types of catering establishments throughout London and the Home Counties. But the location is better because a lot of our work is in the West End. If a restaurant calls up for a second delivery in Piccadilly, we’re there in 20 minutes. From Bow, you’ve got the Blackwall Tunnel traffic, then the Mile End Road or Bow Road to contend with. It makes a big difference.”

Family affair

Gareth, Jim and James

Harwoods has an accounts office in Kent, where Jim and his wife Trish live, and Harwoods of Kent, which trades out of NCGM and delivers throughout Kent. “My three sons Gareth, Josh and James all work in the firm. Josh runs Kent, which is great as it splits the brothers up and reduces the arguing!,” Jim laughs. “We had more or less stopped the Kent business, as it took a lot of time and was affecting the London business at times, but since Josh started to build it up again in a more dedicated way just before lockdown, he’s done really well.

“A lot of it is word of mouth and we’ve got more work through loyal customers like The West House in Biddenden, a chef we’ve supplied for over 30 years. I’m proud of Josh because it’s a hard nut to crack. He’s got a driver and separate staff and the deliveries go all over Kent and as far as Folkestone.”

Family is central to the firm, and it’s clear talking to Jim exactly how much love he has for what he still looks at as his Dad’s business, and the responsibility he has felt to make it work over the last 25 years. “My brother came out of the business just after my Dad passed away in 1997. My Mum almost sold the business to a NCGM firm, in fact, but I didn’t want to go and work for my Dad’s business under someone else. So, to cut a long story short, I bought it from her. It was hard in the beginning – I was still quite young and I was used to working with my Dad, so him not being there hurt.

“To this day, every decision, including when we moved over here, in the back of my mind is ‘what would the Old Man say?’. He loved Spitalfields, his first business was in the old Spitalfields and he sold that to Midland Garden Produce and ended up picking some of that business back up when MGP closed down. That’s when Harwoods was born – we started with just three customers.

“At the beginning of lockdown, when we could see what was coming, I took the decision to downsize and moved units. A lot of people said I’d over-reacted at first. But I thought ‘this is my Dad’s business’ – I can’t risk that. I didn’t want to take loans and then have to pay them back if the business couldn’t continue. I’m glad I did that now, because we’ve made ourselves more efficient and we’re bigger than we’ve ever been.

“It wasn’t that Dad didn’t like the Garden, he was just loyal to Spitalfields, having spent years and years there. Things like that nag away at you, but when my wife first came to see the new units last year and what we have here now compared to what we had before, she said ‘if you’re dad was alive now and saw all this, he’d be so proud’. I hope he would be. I don’t mind admitting, I was actually a bit emotional.”

New facilities

Just over a year since moving into his new units, Jim is delighted with how it’s gone. “We’ve been in the Market 13 years now and we’d worked out of three different units (in D and B blocks) before moving into our brand-new facilities in the newly finished block A in October 2022,” he says. “This unit – A205-206 – we designed it ourselves and actually, we based a lot of it on the old Chef’s Connection units we used to be in and now it’s exactly as we want it, like a home from home. In fact, the journey home can take a long time, so sometimes I get my nut down for a few hours, get up, have a bit of toast, have a shower and get back in the Market at 10pm without the stress of driving in.

“Downstairs, it’s just a different world to what it was. When I look back, I don’t know how we did it before. We got a 5-star hygiene rating. They gave us a bit of a hard time, which is fair enough, but the main thing they were worried about was the specification on the bottle of sanitiser, so that would suggest there wasn’t anything else they could find to worry about. Our clients ask for all sorts of certifications and ratings and we are able to supply them with proof of how well we operate.

“The difference is quite amazing. Even though the floorspace downstairs is the same as we had in the old unit, where it was tight, we have got the upstairs space. It’s not being fully utilised yet, but we have moved things around to make more use of the space and we know we have room to expand in to. We could double the size of the business if we wanted to.”

Jim reached his half century this year and admits that that scale of expansion might not happen while he’s around, but with three sons and a grandson (so far), there’s plenty of time!

“The boys want to carry on and I think sometimes they’d quite like me out of the way,” he laughs. “When I go on holiday, I come back and pick up on things and they don’t always like it, but to be fair to them, I can always tell they’ve cleaned and tidied everything up the day before I get back!”

When he’s not on holiday, Jim is on Buyers’ Walk most nights and the firm buys almost all of its product from wholesalers here. Like so many who work the types of hours that are the norm in this Market, pulling back isn’t easy. “I’m not officially supposed to work weekends these days, but when I’ve got a night off, I’m looking to see how busy it is. If we’re short staffed, I’m coming in, because I enjoy it. It’s a bit of a drug if I’m honest,” Jim says.

“It's a family up here, isn’t it? It’s what I say I say to Trish. When the proverbial hits the fan and it comes to the crunch, we all come together. When somebody is ill or dies, everyone knows each other and we all rally around, donate to good causes. I think that’s nice.”

Harwoods history

Founded by James Harwood Dew (Jim) and his wife Janice, Harwoods of London was established in 1989, in the middle of a world recession. It represented Jim’s second-coming as a greengrocer, as after working in the trade for two decades, he had sold his first business and with Janice, become a successful publican at a pub and restaurant in the heart of Kent.

Jim fell ill and wasn’t expected to recover, so the couple gave up the pub. Ever-resilient, he did recover though and backed by his two sons, decided to start a new business, a more personal service catering for each chef customer’s differing personal needs. Harwoods of London (Wholesale Greengrocers) was formed with just three customers, but it wasn't long before word and Jim’s reputation got around and the business expanded.

Sadly Jim's health declined again and in March 1997, he passed away, shortly after his first grandson was born, to in his words “carry on the good work”.

Janice retired and in March 1998, youngest son James (also Jim) took over the business with his wife Patricia.

Jim Jr and Patricia continued to increase the trade, moving with the times and into larger customised premises at New Covent Garden Market. Harwoods of London remains a family-run business; their three sons, Gareth, Josh and James are all in the fold now and you could say the fourth generation is coming through now as Josh just had a little boy.

Today, Harwoods supplies fresh fruit and vegetables to all types of catering establishments throughout London and the Home Counties.

Delivering consistent quality on a daily basis established the business’s reputation and has enabled it to grow and prosper.

Exotic produce is a specialty and the firm offers a wide range of non-fresh products, including frozen.

South Herefordshire grower Wye Valley Produce is auctioning off the first British asparagus of the year in memory of Damian Fowler.

Run by the Chinn family, Wye Valley Produce would normally expect its first asparagus to be available in early March, but it has already begun harvesting, well in advance of the traditional ‘official start’ of the season on April 23rd.

The Chinn family has developed innovative sustainable growing methods and experimented with varieties to extend the homegrown asparagus season. They also have an established tradition of auctioning off the first boxes of each season, with full proceeds being donated to charity. This year they are supporting the Oracle Cancer Trust, the UK’s leading charity dedicated to head and neck cancer, in memory of Damian, who died in January. He had been a loyal, long-term customer of Wye Valley Produce in his role as managing director of Gilgrove.

Damian’s funeral, on Wednesday February 7th, was extremely well attended and a poignant and fitting send-off for one of New Covent Garden’s most popular figures. His wife Jess has set up a Just Giving page in Damian’s memory – which has already raised well in excess of £20,000 for the Oracle Cancer Trust.

If anyone would like to make a donation, please click here and for more information about the Oracle Cancer Trust, click here

Wye Valley Produce supplies English asparagus to French Garden.

Great Ormond Street Hospital Children’s Charity – known as GOSH Charity – held their annual ‘Love GOSH’ fundraiser this week, featuring a donation of stunning single-stem roses donated by Flower Market business Bloomfield Wholesale Florist Ltd. 

Pictured above: one of the tables at The Londoner Hotel fundraiser, featuring a display created with roses donated by New Covent Garden Flower Market.

Bloomfield’s Sam Hardcastle was delighted to support the fundraising event for the second year running, which was again held at Leicester Square's Londoner Hotel on Thursday 8 February. “It’s a privilege to be able to support Great Ormond Street Hospital for a successive year as it’s a wonderful organisation,” says Sam, who donated 360 red, white, and pink roses to decorate the event's tables.

Pictured above: Bloomfield's Justin O'Brien with the 360 roses ready to be delivered to the event

The Love GOSH gala dinner saw 360 London-based guests invited to support the wonderful work of Great Ormond Street Hospital, with the Flower Market’s involvement reflected in a brochure given to guests on the night. “Last year’s event raised an amazing £750,000, and we’re hoping to have beaten that sum this year,” says Lilly O’Brien, Event Manager at Great Ormond Street Hospital. “We really appreciate the Flower Market’s generosity and all funds raised will support the hospital brand-new state-of-the-art Children’s Cancer Centre, located close to Russell Square in Holborn.”

Find out more about The Children's Cancer Centre – and how to donate – here.

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