The world's oldest health food shop still trading… well, probably
The world's oldest health food shop still trading… well, probably
City centre independent store shows that retail miracles can still happen
This is a story that ought to provoke a smile or two over the weekend muesli. It’s a tale of service, of survival against the odds, and of magnificent longevity. A small, independent retail business, hidden in plain sight in Edinburgh’s expensive city centre, catering to locals for 120 years.
It was ground-breaking when it was first established all those years ago. For most of the time since then it’s been a family and friends affair, and still serves customers who’ve been coming through its door since the 1950s.
Hanover Healthfoods is a tiny, basement health store at 40 Hanover Street in Edinburgh. It has had 7 careful owners in 120 years and is a specialist in natural products. It is also a multi award-winning business having been Best Speciality Retailer at the Scottish Independent Retail Awards for 3 years in the last decade. Hanover Healthfoods is also proud to be the first retailer in the UK to be an Accredited Living Wage, Pension and Hours Employer. It may well be the Oldest Continuously Trading Health Store in the World.
Even just looking back less than 20 years, Hanover Healthfoods has quietly gone about its business through two enormously challenging trading periods, a global pandemic, and a combination of trading factors over the past few years that has been eye-watering.
Retail business failures have become a daily occurrence over the past year in the UK. Last year, 2331 insolvencies equated to a 22.6% increase over 2022, and sadly that trend is predicted to worsen in the current year.
Which makes the achievement all the more remarkable, particularly when you throw in high city centre rates and the refusal of the Scottish Government to pass on the 75% post-covid relief enjoyed by similar businesses south of the border.
Current owner John McKee told us: “It’s staggering to think that when it first opened the store was one of the pioneers of a new movement to allow people to buy healthy, good, unadulterated food. And that remains the reason many of our customers come through the doors today.”
The first health food store in the UK opened in Birmingham in 1989, and was named after Sir Isaac Pitman of shorthand fame, who was a vegetarian for 60 years. Edinburgh was not far behind.
The store was founded as ‘Health Goods Depot’ in 1904 and was owned by a Mrs Mary Bertram who paid a rent of £44 per year. Before that, the premises were occupied by Mrs Jack’s Haggis, Beef and Ham Shop. John said: “. Cases of food adulteration in the late Victorian period were rife, therefore, many people began to embrace a more natural form of eating and living.
“That adulteration included things like ‘bulking’ -and an example would be the addition of sawdust to bread. Another concern was around the use of heavy metals, or heavy metal by products, in food production. For example, arsenic was sometimes used as a food colouring.”
One particularly nasty example had tragic consequences; in 1848, one man died and several others fell ill after too much of it was used to colour a blancmange at a dinner in Northampton.
In the years that followed, the movement grew to the extent that in the years leading up to the First World War Hanover Healthfoods was not even the only health food store in Hanover Street. And there was a health food restaurant nearby, pioneers who helped pave the way for others including the much-loved Henderson’s to follow.
It was taken over by Edwin Rodbourn in 1908, and he expanded to two more stores in Bruntsfield, and he subsequently sold the store to Andrew Burnett. He in turn sold to Robert Ainslie in 1933, and his family was to go on to own the store for the next 82 years. A Musselburgh brewer, he was determined it was a family business and in the decade that followed his daughter Maggy would run the shop, and cut a familiar figure in the street in her sporting Jaguar car.
Ainslie Friel, Maggy’s son, recalls working in the shop from the 1960s. ‘When I first started in the shop one of my jobs was to pack down nuts which came in big metal tins. One of the most popular products at the time was Granose Saviand which was like a vegan form of Spam. Herbal products, like Lanes Quiet Life, had already been popular for several decades.
“The market was very different as a lot of products like prunes and pure honey were not available in supermarkets so people had to use health food stores. We had queues outside to get in, as did Valvona and Crolla, which also sold products which you couldn’t easily buy. And we were the only health food store in the City Centre by then which helped.’
Current owner John McKee, started working at the shop on Saturdays in the 1990s. ‘In the 1970s Ainslie recognised that there was a lot more demand for nutritional supplements and that became our specialty. Since the 1970s we have always trained our staff to understand what to recommend.
“That continues today and I’m sure that it is a critical part of how we have remained in business for as long as we have. We have customers who have trusted us ever since the 1950s and we are always proud to be told by customers that we are the only place they trust to give the best advice.’
John took over the business in 2015 and expanded the store with more food and organic skincare. ‘Expanding our range was one of my best decisions. Buying a business 4 years before Covid? Not so much! The fall off in city centre footfall took us to the brink but I’m delighted to say that we back to full strength in time to celebrate this pretty historic achievement.”
And celebrate they will. Beginning 13 May the store will be giving away 120 goody bags with £120 of products. John said: “We’re being supported in this by our suppliers in doing this, which is a massive thank you to our customers. We are happy to see anyone come through the door, of course, but we have some amazing customers. We have one lady in her 80s who lives locally, and she’s been coming pretty much all of her life. We’re very grateful.”
What’s the secret of Hanover Healthfoods’ longevity? ‘Well, it isn’t our location!’, says John. ‘We are definitely hidden in plain sight. Although we are in the city centre we are down in the basement, below eye-level and set back a little. You can’t even see the store from the other side of the road.
“I think it is because of the length and depth of our knowledge. I was privileged to work for Ainslie for 20 years so the knowledge within the business overlaps owners and goes back decades. Put simply, we tell it how it is, making a sale is not important but building long term trust and relationships is. This is a place for people to interact, laugh, and to learn, not just a business.’