Shop front –

the changing face of retail

We took our first steps into the world of Retail in the late 1960s when we opened our very first ‘Gift and Thrift’ shops.

Surprisingly little was written about our earliest gift shops in our annual reports from the time. The first real mention of them comes in 1971 when we’d set up 15 gift shops across the UK. They sold items such as cards, pens and pencils, photographs, magazines and used postage stamps.

A former Assistant Area Secretary of ours, Paul Peters, remembers there being no proper tills in the early shops, just a biscuit tin or desk drawer to put the takings in. Many of the early shops were thought to be set up in disused PDSA dispensaries.

As the number of shops grew on high streets up and down the country, more customers got to know about the charity and who they were supporting for the first time. By 2005 we had more than 180 shops trading.

Over the years we’ve also had thousands of great donations and some unusual finds too – from a large canoe to a pair of false teeth and a shower cubicle. Sometimes we had a local celebrity or photogenic pet to open a new shop. In 1991 we had a shop in Ryde, Isle of Wight, which was opened by a six-foot long python from the local zoo called Celia.

Thankfully most items donated to our shops nowadays are very saleable and of good quality.

 

"Over the years we’ve also had thousands of great donations and some unusual finds too - from a large canoe to a pair of false teeth and a shower cubicle"

 

In some of the photos on this page you can see how our shop fronts have changed with new signage, but the most significant changes are happening outside of the traditional shop in online retailing and selling some of our most valuable donations on the online auction site eBay. We’re also looking at introducing new technology into our shops to give our customers an even better shopping experience.

One thing that hasn’t changed is the way our volunteers have always been a key part of our retail success. We owe them a huge debt for the way they give us their time and experience to help raise funds for sick and injured pets and help to keep our shops a firm feature of the high street.

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We took our first steps into the world of Retail in the late 1960s when we opened our very first ‘Gift and Thrift’ shops.

Surprisingly little was written about our earliest gift shops in our annual reports from the time. The first real mention of them comes in 1971 when we’d set up 15 gift shops across the UK. They sold items such as cards, pens and pencils, photographs, magazines and used postage stamps.

A former Assistant Area Secretary of ours, Paul Peters, remembers there being no proper tills in the early shops, just a biscuit tin or desk drawer to put the takings in. Many of the early shops were thought to be set up in disused PDSA dispensaries.

As the number of shops grew on high streets up and down the country, more customers got to know about the charity and who they were supporting for the first time. By 2005 we had more than 180 shops trading.

Over the years we’ve also had thousands of great donations and some unusual finds too – from a large canoe to a pair of false teeth and a shower cubicle. Sometimes we had a local celebrity or photogenic pet to open a new shop. In 1991 we had a shop in Ryde, Isle of Wight, which was opened by a six-foot long python from the local zoo called Celia.

Thankfully most items donated to our shops nowadays are very saleable and of good quality.

 

"Over the years we’ve also had thousands of great donations and some unusual finds too - from a large canoe to a pair of false teeth and a shower cubicle"

 

In some of the photos on this page you can see how our shop fronts have changed with new signage, but the most significant changes are happening outside of the traditional shop in online retailing and selling some of our most valuable donations on the online auction site eBay. We’re also looking at introducing new technology into our shops to give our customers an even better shopping experience.

One thing that hasn’t changed is the way our volunteers have always been a key part of our retail success. We owe them a huge debt for the way they give us their time and experience to help raise funds for sick and injured pets and help to keep our shops a firm feature of the high street.

We took our first steps into the world of Retail in the late 1960s when we opened our very first ‘Gift and Thrift’ shops.

In some of the photos on this page you can see how our shop fronts have changed with new signage, but the most significant changes are happening outside of the traditional shop in online retailing and selling some of our most valuable donations on the online auction site eBay. We’re also looking at introducing new technology into our shops to give our customers an even better shopping experience.

We took our first steps into the world of Retail in the late 1960s when we opened our very first ‘Gift and Thrift’ shops.

Surprisingly little was written about our earliest gift shops in our annual reports from the time. The first real mention of them comes in 1971 when we’d set up 15 gift shops across the UK. They sold items such as cards, pens and pencils, photographs, magazines and used postage stamps.

A former Assistant Area Secretary of ours, Paul Peters, remembers there being no proper tills in the early shops, just a biscuit tin or desk drawer to put the takings in. Many of the early shops were thought to be set up in disused PDSA dispensaries.

As the number of shops grew on high streets up and down the country, more customers got to know about the charity and who they were supporting for the first time. By 2005 we had more than 180 shops trading.

Over the years we’ve also had thousands of great donations and some unusual finds too – from a large canoe to a pair of false teeth and a shower cubicle. Sometimes we had a local celebrity or photogenic pet to open a new shop. In 1991 we had a shop in Ryde, Isle of Wight, which was opened by a six-foot long python from the local zoo called Celia.

Thankfully most items donated to our shops nowadays are very saleable and of good quality.

"Over the years we’ve also had thousands of great donations and some unusual finds too - from a large canoe to a pair of false teeth and a shower cubicle"

In some of the photos on this page you can see how our shop fronts have changed with new signage, but the most significant changes are happening outside of the traditional shop in online retailing and selling some of our most valuable donations on the online auction site eBay. We’re also looking at introducing new technology into our shops to give our customers an even better shopping experience.

One thing that hasn’t changed is the way our volunteers have always been a key part of our retail success. We owe them a huge debt for the way they give us their time and experience to help raise funds for sick and injured pets and help to keep our shops a firm feature of the high street.