New family for Pricecutter

Ruapehu Bulletin, 1 December 1992, Page 6

New family for Pricecutter

Raetihi* s family supermarket now has a new family - the Cawseys. Dave and Fiona and their three children have swapped Auckland city life for what they are more used to - small town life. "I'm from originally from Dannevirke and Fiona is from Eltham, so we know small towns," said Dave. He said they have been looking for some time for a grocery business in a small town somewhere in the North Island. "We were very lucky to find Graham and Nona's store for sale - this kind of opportunity, where they have built up a solid business, does not come up very often." Dave has worked for Newmans as coach driver

for the past 15 years, driving the AucklandTurangi- Auckland route six days a week. He said

he won't miss the hour-each-way trip between home and work he travelled either end of his bus route. In his 15 years he clocked up one and a half million kilometres on the road. Fiona is a Karitane nurse, who will be working in the Pricecutter store as well as looking after the children. They both said they originally moved to Auckland for their work. They have no major plans for the store at this stage. "Graham has done up the shop over the past 12 months so it is looking good. We plan to get to know the people, our customers." They see a good future for Raetihi Pricecutter, with the recent purchase of the Pricecutter group by Foodland Australia Limited. "We will be able to buy our goods cheaper, and therefore offer better prices to our customers," said Dave. Dave said they will be staying open six days a week, 8am to 6pm, until Christmas. They will review their hours in the new year. Big changes Handing over the keys to the new owners of Pricecutter Raetihi marks the end of 45 years in the grocery business for Graham Fredericksen. He and his wife Nona plan to stay in Raetihi, for their semi-retirement. They will continue to operate their rural deliv-

ery service, which means keeping in touch with lots of their friends and customers, said Graham. Reminiscing on those 45 years brings up many changes to the way we spend our money over the years. When he started working for Charlie Perry in his store, grocers sold just dry goods, said Graham. They didn't sell vegetables or fruit, meat (apart from tinned meat and smallgoods such as bacon), and they had no refrigerators let alone freezers so there were no frozen vegetables, and no icecream sold at grocers' stores. Those were the days when there were two butcher's shops in Raetihi, five grocery stores, plus dairies (for the icecream!) and green grocers. Graham used to deliver groceries by bicycle - "just like the one Granville uses on TV", says Graham. When he started rationing coupons were still being used because of the shortages caused by the war. Coupons were needed to buy such things as butter, sugar, tea, clothing and petrol. "Once you used up your coupons, you went without." Graham has seen the range of goods available to his customers grow enormously in 45 years. "Biscuits came loose in big tins and we sold them by weight, and there weren't many to Tum to page 7