Smith & Webb Cookshop

Reviews about Smith & Webb Cookshop

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  Glen Ocsko Review added: 2018.07.30

  ★ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆
  Imagine, if you will, the situation I was in. I had recently divorced, and thanks to an unexpected situation found myself with enough money to invest in an entirely new set of cookware, appliances and utensils for my kitchen. Brilliant, right?! The chance to make a break from the past and stop using things which were many years old and brought back memories of happier times cooking for a slightly bigger family.
  
  I'm a big fan of shopping local, so rather than head to a major chain shop I instead made my way to Smith & Webb Cookshop in West Malling one Sunday afternoon with my four children. They were excited. They love helping me cook and actually cooking themselves. My eldest two can each prepare meals from curries to full sunday roasts and many more besides, whilst the younger two are still learning. It's a skill I've been desperate to teach them; now I'd be able to teach them about what to buy so they'd be better prepared for when they eventually have to buy cookware of their own.
  
  We walked into the store. No welcome at all. Fine, I thought; the shop tender must just have been having a bad day. I took a quick look at the collections of pots and pans on display, looking for a copper set as I'd done a bit of research and knew what I wanted. While I did that, my children walked off to look at some things and help me get ideas for all the things we would buy. I wanted a complete matching set for the first time in my life. A weird thing, I know, but I was tired of having years worth of random utensils, pots, pans and appliances.
  
  Before I know it, the shoptender is telling one of my children off for picking up a salt grinder. A salt grinder. Not a crystal decanter; a practical, tough, hard-wearing piece of kit that my daughter's seven year old hands were well accustomed to holding and using. I was a bit shocked by how aggressive the shop tender had been in her words and tone, but tried to move past it.
  
  The next thing I know, the shop tender has left her post to tell my son to not look at a cafetiere. Again, not a priceless shop heirloom; a cafetiere. I know he's only eleven, but he strangely has a taste for coffee (I'm aware of how middle-class that makes me sound, but what can I do?! He even has a preferred type of olive). He's used cafetieres for a while - full ones, mind you, not empty ones - so knows perfectly well not to pick them up and throw them to the floor.
  
  That wasn't good enough for this shop tender, though. She can't ever have had any children in her shop or in her kitchen, at least not well behaved ones. Had my children been running around smashing things, knocking them over, moving them from place to place and generally causing trouble then I could understand her over-the-top reactions. To rudely and aggressively tell two children not to touch things within 30 seconds, in the tone of voice she did and with no hint of explanation or awareness of how that would look to their parent is pretty damn poor.
  
  So I took my kids and left, explaining that we would instead go shopping somewhere that we were actually welcome at. I know they probably have bigger orders than I am going to be making, but for me it's a big investment and I really wanted their help. Instead I'll have to spend my £1200 somewhere else, and hope they can help me with my copper-bottomed questions, my blender queries, my utensil ponderings and my general appliance musings.
  
  Not only have you lost me as a customer this time round, you've lost me and my children's business for life. And that's a sad thing for me.

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