Saturday, October 5

Plantagen run garden centres across the Nordic region and they (like many businesses) suffered greatly during and after the pandemic, as consumers stayed at home and then felt the longer term economic consequences. The Finnish company recently announced it would restructure, and then announced that it would close down completely.

Today the branch 200 metres from our house began its closing down sale. Inevitably they got the kind of customer interest that would have kept them afloat had it occurred any other way.

I stand in the queue while Irma scouts around an returns with things to add to the trolley. Not that many things, as it turns out. We suspect that some, maybe many, people got up early this morning and queued at dawn to get the good stuff.

We queue for almost forty minutes to get a go at the checkout. The queue snakes all the way round the shop and then all the way round the outdoor area where the larger plants grow.

We will miss wandering down here when we can’t think of anything better to do. We have bought a lot of plants that way.