What an experience this has been. Something as simple and as straight forward as creating a nice useable space outside of Brew Bear has turned into a local media frenzy of front pages, news articles and social media posts.
Let me be clear, the whole situation has NOTHING to do with my “at home euthanasia” advert which has been photographed many times. It is easy to report this as the main catalyst, but ironically the issue is displaying an advert without consent. Any advert. I own Evesham Vets and it is a business based in Evesham with 59 High Street being its registered office. All this fuss has come about from Evesham Town Council and the District Council poking their nose into a local business from what appears to be an issue with my decision to operate as a cashless business. Well firstly, thank you for doing this, the media coverage alone has been exceptional and I dare say, it isn’t over yet.
Here are some links to some articles:
What exactly is the issue?
Advertisement consent. It turns out a business needs to have specific planning permission in order to advertise. Click here for more information about this.
Fair is fair, I didn’t have advertisement consent. I did have a pavement licence which detailed the use of “cafe barriers”. I have made a recommendation to the council that the pavement licence application should specifically reference advertisement consent. If it did, guess what, I’d have submitted the application at the same time. Anyway, it turns out the majority of businesses do not enjoy having advertising consent. The council literally does nothing about it, unless there is a complaint which means businesses do not get treated fairly, but hey, that is life and business at the end of the day.
What is happening now?
Quite simply, I have a few options. I can apply for planning permission to put my barriers back out with advertisements on them. I can put them out, plain in colour and devoid of any reference to any business. I can leave the area without my cafe barriers, which to be fair does not have the same appeal as it was intended.
A planning application takes approximately two months and by the time it is finalised, it will be around July before my barriers can return. Assuming I submitted it in April. I’m yet to decide what I want to do and this is something I will keep considering.
In addition to this, the whole situation has exposed the council whether that is district or town to not follow their own rules. To make this quite clear, I operate my businesses within the law and I have no issue with anyone holding a business to account for not following the rules, whether intentional or not. But what I do have issue with, is the council not following their own policies, rules and laws. Even to the point they have directly lied in email about this situation, on more than one occasion.
The timing of this has been fortunate to the point there is a local election for town councillor in May this year. I have submitted my paperwork and I am on the ballot. Whether I am successful or not will remain to be seen, but I will not stand by and let council staff, councillors and their connections single out a business in the very town they are quite vocal about supporting.
The Angry Person - Gilbert with a capital G
Here is a screenshot of how one individual whom I will call Gilbert, displayed their anger at my running for councillor as well as the media coverage I have been getting. If I was a volleyball fan I’d use Wilson, like in the film castaway, but I’m not, I own a Gilbert rugby ball and Gilbert is such a more appropriate name, particularly how this happened over the Easter break. Eggs and that.
It doesn’t take long to work out who Gilbert actually is. In fact they portray themselves as the guru of Evesham businesses and let me be clear about this, would you want someone who enjoys the use of the exclamation mark so frequently to recommend and promote your business? All hypothetically of course.
To Be Continued
What the next stage will bring remains to be seen. What I do know, Is I will continue to find ways to promote and improve Brew Bear as a business, establish itself on the high street and continue to provide an enjoyable experience for the customers that use us. Until the next chapter…