Name: Richard Edwards and Dawn Edwards

Business: Covent Garden

Opening hours: 7.30am until 5.30pm from Monday until Saturday

When did you start your business and why?

My BROTHER had this business for five years, and eventually he got to a stage where he wanted to take a step back from it, so I decided to take over from him and keep the place family run and familiar for all of our customers. Years ago I’d work on the stall with my dad at the market, then I worked in wholesale and now retail, so it’s a business I’m familiar with.

Why in this location?

Obviously it’s right next to Central Car Park, so really it is a prime position. No disrespect to other shops in town, but I think we really benefit from being here.

With customers often coming here and leaving with big, heavy bags of potatoes and other fruits and vegetables, it enables them to take the things they’ve purchased back to their cars without too much of a struggle.

If we were in the middle of town, we would probably have a lot of people walking past because they’d know they would have to carry anything they bought a long way. We are in Oswestry because it’s a place we’ve lived our whole lives.

Tell us about your business

Basically, we’re a local family firm which caters for everyone’s fruit and vegetable needs. I took over a few months ago from my brother.

We do primarily buy locally, especially in the summer, but occasionally we also source goods from Birmingham and Liverpool.

What we really try to do is keep the community feel about the shop and keep it running as an independent food shop in Oswestry.

It’s quite unique because aside from some of the big supermarkets, we are the only individual fruit shop.

What is your proudest moment?

I THINK keeping the girls here in their jobs was great. It would’ve been easy to get rid of staff to save money for rent or other things, but they would have been out of jobs, so I’m happy they’re still here.

I like that it’s an authentic fruit and veg shop, and I also like that there are a lot of people who come through the doors who I’ve known for years now. People are familiar with the faces they see when they come through the door and it’s nice to get to know them over time. I enjoy doing what I do, and if you’re enjoying what you do, you must be right for it.

Any strange requests?

Not really no – we have some people who request exotic fruits, for example dragonfruits or lychees, but I can get all of that quite easily.

Some fruits can be harder to find than others, but I usually know where I can find them.

There is one man who comes in and asks for a specific type of chilli, but I’ve looked absolutely everywhere and I can’t get my hands on them.

Other than that, I don’t think there’s anything I’d say is strange.