A.T. Welch has traded from the same narrow shop on Hospital Street since 1922, a building barely twelve feet wide that runs back 145 feet to a café at the rear. Bill and Bronwen Austin bought the business from the Welch family in 1966, and their sons Roger and Stuart now run it as the fourth generation of the family in the grocery trade. The front counter sells home-cured bacon and sausages made daily on site, alongside a delicatessen range of cheeses and cooked meats. Down the corridor, the café seats ninety beneath a replica 1940s grocery display the Austins built in 1982, packed with ration-era packaging and bygones. School groups and passing visitors stop for the memorabilia as much as the pork pies. The shop closes on Mondays and Sundays.
Surveyed