Expensive Free Cutlery

Every day a guy comes to our office to sell his wares. He owns a sandwich shop in the centre of Glasgow on the next block to our premises and many people would just go there for their lunches etc. After a while I suppose of getting to know faces he arranged to bring baskets of his food to our office mid morning to save people the walk at lunchtime, and of course to his benefit he had a captive audience.

There are seven floors with around 40 people on each and I think at least 10 people on each floor buy stuff from him, spending an average of £2 each. That's an almost guaranteed extra income of £140 a day approximately, £700 a week, £36400 a year.

50 metres past his shop there is a supermarket. I always go in there before I get to the office. He was in front of me one day, buying huge bunches of bananas. He walked straight out across to his shop. He sells bananas in there for 50p each, as part of this "5 a day" thing people have got going on. I pay around 15p - 20p for a banana in the supermarket. If I went to him, with me getting a couple each day, I'd be giving him an extra £156 every year.

The number of times I see my colleagues flocking to his baskets when he comes onto our floor, trying to get to him as quick as they can is comical. They pay him about 60p for a pot of yoghurt that costs about 35p at the supermarket across the street. His rolls and sandwiches are made by him fresh that day and they pay him for the privilege. A basic roll with some cheese and tomoto is around £1.90. One of my colleagues once asked him if he had only cheese rolls and he offered to take out the tomato, and reduced the price to £1.10. 80p for a single slice of tomato!!


The other day one guy actually said to him "I've only been off two days and it's gone up 20p". He didn't didn't even crack a smile, and my pal was still bitching about it when he got back to his desk still within the guy's earshot. I suppose it's city centre prices. He's got to make his rent and costs and we've got to eat but do we have to give him over £36,000 every year because we can't be arsed walking a hundred metres to a supermarket? People have said that his prices are dear, especially after the 80p tomato slice incident and a couple of people stopped buying from him and actually go to another place around the corner now.

For the people who still use his services, I thank you, as you give me much enjoyment watching you scurry over to him to buy your expensive rolls and cheese (single slice) and yoghurts. One thing though, he does supply free plastic cutlery. Mind you, he probably lifted that from the supermarket. I know I did.