Once Upon a Shop

The essay ”Once Upon a Shop” is written by Jeanette Winterson in 2010. Winterson opened up a little a little store called Verde in Spitalfields. The author Jeanette Winterson had been offered to sell her building to a big coffee company, but she rejected the offer because of wrong politics. Winterson used to live in London, but moved to Spitalfield to live on the countryside. The whole story is about how the big food chains like Tesco dominates the market and pushes the little shops aside. Winterson point is, that quality should be over quantity; it’s not about making a huge profit but being a human being. The world has changed since the Napoleon wars and the Irish potato crisis, but in a negative direction.

In “Once Upon a shop” we’re seeing two different markets, the old and the new. Jeanette Winterson has experienced both. Spitalfields used to be the fruit and veg market in London since the Middle Ages, but the market has now moved out to Nine Elms. “The pyramids of oranges, gassed lemons, King Kong size bananas, forest of parsley, potato towers and crates of peas, red tomatoes, pink grapefruit, deep-stacked beetroot, all as creatively piled as anything in Tate Modern” Here you see how good old quality pesticide-free food has turned into history and the little corner shops are facing the same problem. The food market is being dominated by food chains such as Tesco, and it makes it hard for little shops to survive. “ I prefer individuality and eccentricity and self-determination all the things the free market is supposed to deliver, and never does because markets soon become homogenous and anti-competitive. “ Winterson is aware of this problem and she puts the blame on capitalism.   She thinks everything is the same and that the era of quality food is over, but her shop Verde is something special. It focuses on quality and not making a huge profit and fooling the customers. Quality over money is also one of the big themes in this text.   “I was vegetarian for...