The Geographer - after the lockdown

Cafés and restaurants have been among the businesses worst affected by the pandemic, but The Geographer is coming out of the crisis looking to the future. Esmé Kovacs asked Caroline Child about the impact of Covid-19 on this popular local meeting-point.

In the seven years since The Geographer opened on Station Road, the café and store has become a much-loved feature of village life. It’s a place where friends can catch up over coffee, share a slice of cake, browse through the wide selection of food and gift items and have a chat with the smiley staff.

When the coronavirus pandemic hit the UK and national lockdown was announced in mid-March, it was just two weeks after The Geographer’s new extension was finally unveiled. Although business owners Caroline and David Child are used to thinking on their feet, this particular bolt from the blue was one that they certainly couldn’t have prepared for. But rather than despair at their bad luck, they have used it as an opportunity to plan a new way of serving customers and make some changes they’d been thinking about for a while.

A shared experience

Now, ten weeks after closure, The Geographer is back in business and looking with enthusiasm to the future. Almost all its customers are regulars and Caroline explained: “Although we’ve sadly lost a lot of customers from Vision Park, we’ve gained a wonderful community of people working from home who we had never met before.”

A big positive was having the time to plan to reopen safely. She continued: “I feel fortunate that we could take our time. No one has seen anything like this before so I felt incredibly protective over staff and customers and didn’t want to reopen without being entirely confident we were doing all we could.

‘We have felt properly cared for as a business in the community – I’m grateful for help and guidance from the HI Covid support team. Local businesses have made stronger support networks too, sharing advice and spare masks. I think right now it feels more than ever that we are all in it together.”

The new normal

Caroline explained: “During our period of closure we thought hard about how it would work when we reopened. We were able to make changes we had been thinking about for a while, such as creating a website with a delivery service, and we decided to put in a zero waste groceries section and start selling fresh fruit and vegetables.

“Due to social-distancing restrictions we are not currently a sit-in café but we are still providing takeaway coffee, cake and lunches as well all our grocery items and handpicked gifts.”

But while The Geographer looks slightly different inside, Caroline is certain the service customers receive when they enter the shop will not have diminished at all.

“The restriction on numbers in the shop has created quite an old-fashioned way of service, which in many ways is better for customers. Although they might have to wait to enter, once inside they can be comfortable and don’t have to rush.”

A green approach

This commitment to delivering the best service possible has also meant staying open to change and constantly innovating. For example, the gifts section has developed over the years as they began to sell eco-friendly gifts.

“We want to focus on having an environmentally friendly aspect to all we do”, Caroline explained.

“I have cared about the environment all my life, but in recent years the energised push towards saving the planet has reignited my principles. My main message about being green is that we don’t need to be perfect but we have to try, in fact the world needs millions of us being imperfect not a few of us being perfect.

“Where possible we use local suppliers – our fruit and vegetables are from Cambridge – and our refill system and compostable packaging are reducing our plastic waste. We aren’t fully vegetarian but we are trying to reduce the amount of meat on the menu also.”

A world view

In fact the planet and its awe-inspiring beauty was what inspired the store concept itself. Caroline explained: “Just after we got married we travelled the world together for a year and in Malaysia, in the beautiful city of Malacca, we found a cafe called The Geographer, which we loved.

“Fast forward, we were looking for a place to base our store in the village and a building which was previously a travel agent became available, full of maps. That felt like a sign so we borrowed the name, and travel and the world became the inspiration for our business. Even now with our green motivation, we are still thinking about the world – just in a slightly different way.”

Clearly its commitment to the local community, coupled with this respect for the planet and the global community, is why The Geographer continues to radiate a warm and welcoming spirit – one that even a pandemic can’t close down.