In My Opinion No question, it’s all very different now, and will continue that way. Laura Daly is back in the ‘new’ shop
I
’m writing this sitting in my office at the shop. With the door shut. In my bubble, as it were. Hand sanitiser bottle on the desk, fighting for space with the anti-bacterial wipes and a bottle of Zoflora for good measure. I’m now on permanent email, phone, and social media duties, and I’m back working in my shop six days a week. Half of my girls are still on furlough as the childcare issues are many and varied. I’ve made a promise to myself never again to take a day off for granted. I’ve worked every single day of the lockdown and, quite honestly, I need a break! The responsibility and the long days are physically draining. Emotionally, I’m a wreck as well – so many 2020 brides with ruined plans and even a handful of cancelled weddings from couples who didn’t make it past three months of being locked up together. Our 2020 brides deserve medals – all of them – they have been wholly pragmatic, accepting and remarkably unfazed, but being the shoulder to cry on has taken its toll!
The other side of my door, Lily is on a charm offensive with her first customer of the day. With social distancing in mind, we’re currently limiting brides to one guest each and we make this very clear when the appointment is arranged. Poor Lily is now having to explain why the bride’s second guest (her sister) must stay outside.
that we’d bend the rules once they’d arrived.
Getting procedures in place There’s the ‘please use the sanitiser’; the offering of masks if anyone feels they need them; the serving of refreshments and the laughter over the fact that the posh china and biscuits has been replaced by biodegradable It’s all happening paper cups and a wrapped cookie, These ladies don’t sound happy and and the form to be signed declaring are demanding to know why they can’t customer and guest ‘Covid-free to the all pile in, just like they did last year best of our knowledge’. when the sister bought her dress… A polite explanation to the bride’s To a background of Apple Music’s Mum on how to dress her daughter in finest chill-out mix, I can just about the changing room follows, and a chat hear Lily going through the reasons, about the pre-booked dresses the even though these ladies have had two bride has requested to see. phone calls and an email informing There’s a quiet seriousness on our them each time of our operational part about it all, punctuated by a joke changes and single guest policy. here and there and a fit of giggles when As a compromise, a chair is found the Mum asks her daughter if she had and, if I squint through the spy hole in remembered to put on her underwear. my door, I can see the sister sitting in Meanwhile, in zone two, owing to the doorway, clearly not amused at the fact that our appointments now all. Turns out Mum had decided not have staggered start times, Mel is to tell her the one guest policy, based still waiting for her guest to arrive, on her completely wrong assumption preparing her area by wiping down all
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