The problem is you are in a minority - supply and demand suggests the need for traditional butchers is on the decline. No one is forced to use a supermarket, Tesco's haven't got a load of staff and prevented customers visiting your butcher. The problem is that for most of us the opportunity cost of visting numerous retailers cannot be justified by the enhanced experience we encounter.

When there are no butchers in a town other than a Tesco or a Sainsbury's, then there is no choice.

There is a reason that phrases and words such as 'Tescopoly' and 'Tesco Town' and 'trolley town' have entered the lexicon – because there are places in the UK that, for instance, have three different-sized Tescos, and that's it. I didn't invent or imagine this situation. And that is not a choice.

Indeed, in a post I made earlier, I explained that, when we first moved into the area we're in, the local street was 3/4 derelict and it simply was not possible to do the weekly shop there. The alternative was therefore one of the myriad Sainsbury's or Tescos that had sprouted up within a 20-minute walk in various directions, or to undertake a bus journey further away to a market somewhere (one of which option was destroyed by stalls being driven out by a landlord hiking rents massively because they could get franchises in instead).

I do not get what part of that is difficult to understand.

That situation has only changed in the last nine years, with the revival of the street, including (but not limited to) a Saturday farmers' market (okay, technical definition, apparently, is a 'fine food market'). And since the businesses that have opened on the street in the last few years seem to be sticking around, they are presumably doing okay. Which also suggests that your assertion that there is no demand for butchers etc is, at best, flawed.

One of the shops that has opened is a fishmonger. This is a young business, run by a team of young people, and it's the particular one I was referring to earlier, when I said that they were changing traditional patterns of opening hours in order to better serve people who work conventional hours and may pop in in the evening on the way home.

They'll prep your fish as much as you need; they'll suggest things to do with it. They even organise cookery/skills classes if you want (something various butchers I'm aware of are also doing).

And let's be quite clear: the demise of high street butchers, replaced by in-store 'butchers', has seen a major deskilling. As Blythman illustrated in the book Coddy linked to, a countrywide experiment, very, very few so-called butcher's counters in supermarkets have staff who know much about cuts of meat or can prepare them. The same applies to fishmongers.

And the whole thing with the burgers with horse and pig in them is illustrative of an issue about the mass production of food – and the mass retailing of it, with the concomitant demand for ever cheaper prices.

Now horse and pig in a 'beef' burger may not actually kill anyone, but that's not the point.

So those who say supermarkets only supply what customers demand ignore the whole advertising industry, money paid by manufactures for shelf position and the millions the retailers spend on store layouts and psychologists , all to get us to but what we really don't want or need.

Sure if there is a choice the customer can go elsewhere but when the independents have been forced out of business that choice is limited to one of the other big 4 retailers, with the same "choice" and the others.

Blockbuster gone now. Who next, I wonder?

The irony when Dominos are the last high street chain standing

In the longer-term the demise of these chains may be a good thing. It paves the way for lower retail rents and the possibility of diverse high streets with exactly the sort of shops Mintball hankers after. Just a thought.

Bored when out of town last week, I went to see the Jack Reacher flick. Next day I mentioned to a site manager that I had seen it and he said he had also seen it as well as the Zero Dark Thirty film as well. I said I thought the latter wasn't out until late January and he said he had downloaded both for nothing. There is no wonder that Blockbuster cannot survive, I doubt any of there films isn't available at some illegal site on the net.

this.
and it's a problem for the government at the minute because they desperately need people to dig out the plastic and go mental, they need self certification mortgages to kick start, they need people to plead with the bank that they can afford the mortgage that's 6 times their salary and they need them to change their 4 year old car for a 2 year old car. unfortunately for them people realised they don't actually need lots of stuff and recalibrated their spending habits, i certainly did and i don't think i'm missing out. i must have wandered into hmv half a dozen times over the xmas period and each time i saw something i ended up walking away as i didn't actually need it whereas in the past i'd have bought the lot.

Seconded.

I wonder how long it will be before people realise it is no longer 'essential' to have the latest Ipad / smartphone.

Well it's obvious that Tesco et al have got you well & truly hooked.

I'm currently operating a franchise, supplying frozen fish meat & poultry and speciality dishes, direct to the door. I have little problem selling ribeye steak at £33 per kilo because when anyone who knows what real steak should look like, they immediately appreciate the difference. Our ribeye, sirloin and fillet comes from a grass-fed, Somerset herd and is hung for 28 days before butchering. Sainsbury's once embarked on a great advertising campaign, shouting that their beef was 21 day matured. It wasn't a great success because they'd already convinced their customers that beef should be red in colour and not chestnut bordering on mahogany. Even my local butcher (a man who knows the name of the beast the cut came from), no longer puts his best cuts in the window, simply because many of his customers have been similarly "conditioned". Many beef joints sold in supermarkets are topside or silverside, both joints that should only really be pot-roasted because they don't have the natural fat to keep them moist. Look at the cooking instructions and they'll tell you nothing about slow or pot-roasting.

Similarly, I sell salmon fillet at £25 per kilo and have never received a single complaint, in fact it's my single best selling product. The difference between my North Atlantic, wild-caught salmon is streets away from the farmed salmon on sale in any supermarket. Next time you visit a supermarket's fishmonger slab, take a close look at the salmon. They keep the skin on to avoid you seeing the layer of fat between the skin and flesh, similarly those white lines that branch from the centre are also fat. Wild salmon is all muscle. I gave a woman a salmon fillet this afternoon, free, gratis and for nothing. She told me she only bought salmon tail fillet because it was less "oily" than the loins. I am convinced I'll have no problem selling her a 2 kilo box next time I visit.

I boast that "If I wouldn't eat it, you won't find it on my van". I wouldn't carry any cod during December because I wasn't happy with the quality. I refuse to ever carry pangasius at all. If you're wondering what pangasius is, you may find it listed as "cobbler" or "Basa". In reality, pangasius is Vietnamese river catfish ad a dirtier fish would be difficult to find on sale, yet the supermarkets are quite happy to stock it. Please don't tell me, that was through customer demand.

I rarely buy any fish or meat from a supermarket because the "fishmongers" and "butchers" employed by them are anything but. Try asking a supermarket butcher for a bone-in shoulder of pork, you won't get it, simply because "head office don't supply it". Now try and find a proper butcher who can supply a joint from a traditional breed like Gloucester Old Spot and follow rland I gurantee you really will "taste the difference".rl

A long time, as people, by-and-large, are idiots.

It is all very well and good championing this sort of thing however you have to take into the account cost. Not everybody can afford to pay £25 per kilo for salmon. I work on the counters at a supermarket (I would never dream of calling myself a fishmonger, my "training" was to spend an afternoon with my colleague so that I could cover on there when needed), but we get people complaining about the price of cod loin which is £19 a kilo, they would have a heart attack if you tried to charge them £25. Yes it might taste better, you might get better knowledge from the staff at a proper fishmongers (I won't say service because supermarket staff can deliever top service within their remit, it isn't our fault we aren't given the training) but what's the point in that if you cannot afford the product?

Do cod have loins ?

I am sure the quality differences are evident to all, the problem is - and the point I am trying to make - is the difference is sufficiently important enough for most to make the effort to seek it out.

If I want something good I will go to Lishman's but the enhanced experience of the food isn't worth an hour round trip every week to get it. For the vast majority of people even a 5 minute trip can't be justified. The chicken I get from the supermarket is more than adequate to fill me fijitas would a superior chicken costing double the price really make that much of a difference to my curry?