Turn Back Time (2010) s01e01 Episode Script
Victorian
One typical British town.
Its high street was once its heart and soul.
Not any more.
But what if we could turn back time to the days of the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker? A group of shopkeepers and their families are leaving the 21 st century behind.
You are going to discover what the high street was really like.
Your aim is to make this town fall in love with its high street again.
"Sell, sell, sell.
" Every week, they'll be living and trading through a different era - Lift it.
from Victorian to Edwardian Rabbits.
Pheasants.
through peacetime and wartime the Swinging '60s to the shocking '70s.
100 years of high street history.
It's absolutely magical.
Can they sell the products of the past to 21 st-century customers? Oh, the poor creatures.
I wouldn't give this to the birds.
Pimpin'.
And can they make a profit? This is unbelievably hard.
I don't know how they did this in the old days.
If I'm really being honest, I hate it.
The journey begins at the birth of the modern high street The pies are on fire.
Sorry! as the shopkeepers graft from dawn till dusk.
What a fat son of unmarried parentage.
Can they persuade the town to love its high street once more? I wish shopping was like this every day.
Four shopkeepers and their families are leaving their 21 st-century lives behind.
Kitted out in Victorian finery, they're on their way to Shepton Mallet in Somerset.
Shepton's once-thriving town centre, like so many in Britain, stands empty and unloved.
The horrible truth is Shepton Mallet's dying.
Online shopping and an out-of-town retail park have left many of its shops empty.
It makes me feel very, very sad and depressed, really.
But all that's about to change.
In Shepton's historic market square, four empty shops have been turned back to the key trades of the Victorian era.
An empty clothes store has been transformed into a 19th-century grocer's.
It will be run by delicatessen owners from Lincolnshire, the Sergison family.
Nothing will faze me.
It's what I do for a living anyway.
I'm just going back in times.
That's the crack.
I think.
We'll find out.
A closed-down bakery has been returned to its original purpose.
It's now a Victorian baker's, complete with wood-fired bread oven.
And taking it on will be artisan bakers from Wales, the Devlins.
I'm feeling a bit apprehensive at the moment, but excited, too, and really, really looking forward to it.
But I've got butterflies.
There's not just a grocer's and baker's, but a candlestick-maker's, too - a derelict shop is now an ironmonger's.
Modern-day blacksmith, Simon Grant-Jones, knows he has his work cut out.
It will be difficult to start with, but I'm confident I can win over the people of Shepton Mallet.
Finally, no Victorian high street was complete without a butcher's shop.
Andrew Sharp and son, Michael, from Cumbria, come from a long line of butchers, going back to Victorian times.
Now they get to see if they can hack it in the world of their ancestors.
We'll be all right.
A lot of knowledge and a bit of blag, we'll be fine.
The families have no idea what they're in for.
They're about to enter a world of dawn-till-dusk graft, where practically everything they sell must be crafted by hand.
And making sure they stick to the ways of Victorian traders will be their very own Chamber of Commerce.
Gregg Wallace isn't just a judge on MasterChef- he's a successful greengrocer with 20 years' experience who knows all the pitfalls of retail.
He is joined by historian, Juliet Gardiner, and fifth-generation baker, Tom Herbert.
This is it.
That's our town.
This is our big experiment.
The loss of the high street is a loss for the whole community.
We want to see if we can get that back.
This is just like a dream come true.
I'm going to see history brought to life.
The Victorian era was when the modern high street was born.
Market traders moved into shops.
But at a time when trading regulations were largely ignored, there were few rules and only one goal - to sell, sell, sell.
With the market square ready, it's time for the Chamber of Commerce to lay down the challenge ahead.
Welcome to the Victorian high street.
This is where you are going to be working and living for the next week.
You are truly going to discover what the Victorian high street was really like.
Victorians would have grabbed any opportunity to sell.
We obviously expect you to do the same.
The end of the week is market day - a brilliant opportunity to clear your stock.
We want you ready for business at nine o'clock tomorrow morning.
Ladies and gentlemen, off to your shops.
Good luck.
The families open for business first thing tomorrow.
They all have the same aim - to bring the people of Shepton back to the town centre and make their shops as profitable as possible.
The grocer's was a cornerstone of the fledgling Victorian high street.
At a time when it was difficult to keep food fresh, most people would visit every day.
The Sergison family - Karl, Debbie, Saffron and Harry - are the first to discover what's in store.
It's wicked.
- Very nice.
This is quality.
- Gosh.
Pickled onions.
Angelica.
What's that? I don't know.
"The best gift to a sick friend is Bovril.
" I do like our grocer.
He is the archetypal wide boy.
Got my butter pats and I'll be able to shape and make my butter.
If he can't sell, no-one can.
They're gonna love him.
Ooh! Jesus wept! He looks like a grocer - prosperous before he starts.
He looks like he's eaten the profits.
Sugar.
Being surrounded by Victorian produce is a dream come true for the Sergisons.
In the modern world, Karl and Debbie run a delicatessen in Spalding, Lincolnshire.
Karl and I have got a great partnership because I make it, he sells it.
There's your change.
Thank you very much.
Karl is a very good salesman.
You know, he could sell ice to the Eskimos.
Fancy a little cake with that, maybe? The grocer's back in the Victorian times, I feel, was the hub of the high street, hub of the community.
And it would be nice to get that sense of community back.
Karl has also long held a romantic view of the Victorians' approach to food.
The high street nowadays is not as good as it used to be, I think.
As you can tell, we make a lot of the stuff ourselves.
We try and re-create what was back in the old days.
19th century, early 20th century, things were a lot purer and had more naturalness.
While they might be delighted with their pre-packed goods, the reality is that most of their stock awaits them out back in sacks of basic ingredients.
What's up there? We've got yellow split peas, onions and potatoes.
Let's get the split peas to stay up there.
Before they can sell it, they'll need to weigh, mix, churn and even roast, as well as wrap everything by hand.
I think it's absolutely fantastic.
We've got all the kit we need to actually make a fair little start and make some money.
Also hoping to attract the business of the people of Shepton is the Victorian pork butcher's.
Look how well placed the butcher is.
You can't miss it.
- That's prime, isn't it? - It's a prime site.
They might have a good location, but Sharp & Son are less impressed with the fixtures and fittings.
I think we've established everything's pretty basic.
That's the thing you're gonna use the most, son, as butcher's boy.
On your hands and knees, scrubbing the floor like I used to have to do.
Yeah, yeah.
I feel like Florence Nightingale.
And without electricity or refrigeration, Andrew and Michael will have to rely on something more basic to preserve their meat.
Ah! Ice.
Butcher's ice was often imported from Norway and only delivered twice a week, so keeping meat fresh was a constant struggle.
It won't give us as much chilling as you would like.
We'll have to flog it quick.
The bakery is equally low-tech.
Oh, wow, this is a bit different.
All these baskets have to be filled up.
Hugely important in the 19th century, bakers' bread provided up to 80% of some people's diet.
Wow.
That's an oven, all right.
Already fired up, as well.
- Come and see this, guys.
- There's no taps.
- Where do we get the water from? - What? There's no aids at all.
Everything is going to be manual.
Very, very hard work.
I can see it already.
In their modern lives, Caroline and Nigel run a successful bakery together in Wales.
My role in the business is very different to Caroline's.
If you see Caroline very much as the baker, front of house, I'm very much back-office.
Caroline's Bakery is somewhere where she's in charge, completely and utterly.
I go in there at my peril at the wrong time.
And Caroline sees running the Victorian bakery as the perfect opportunity to bring proper fresh bread to the town.
I just love creating good bread.
I think we've lost that in society.
I'm really hoping that I can persuade local people to buy fresh bread again.
But as they read through the manual left for them by the Chamber of Commerce, the Devlins are in for a shock.
"The role of the baker was strictly a man's job during the Victorian era.
Female bakers were extremely rare.
" Oh, my God.
"Females in the family may assist in the running of the bakery, but should not get involved with the main bread-making activity.
" It's gonna be difficult, you and I working together, because our roles at home are completely different.
- They're totally reversed.
- Exactly.
No time to waste.
If they want bread for tomorrow morning at nine o'clock, we have to start the process.
I admire your enthusiasm.
Really, I do.
My biggest concern is the ironmonger.
The others are food.
We're used to buying food.
- But who shops in an ironmonger's? - Who needs a mole-trap? Would people even know what an ironmonger was? Oh, my God.
How am I gonna make any money on this? This is all a load of old tat.
The only people who'll be interested in buying this are collectors and people who don't know what they're looking at.
That's the best place for that.
The ironmonger's was a one-stop shop for every Victorian household need.
But blacksmith, Simon, won't just be running a shop.
As a Victorian ironmonger, he will also have to run a fully functioning forge.
This is fantastic.
Look at this old anvil.
Beautiful.
A perfect opportunity for the modern-day blacksmith who yearns to bring respect back to his craft.
Oh, this is absolutely the business.
He's going to be able to make things for the other shopkeepers - scales and scoops and that sort of thing.
I bet he comes into his own, servicing the others.
I can make some money out of this.
I can actually make some money with this.
I could make the gates for Buckingham Palace with this.
12 hours to opening and the butcher's stock has arrived.
Could you not have got us a bigger one? Are you feeling strong, lad? This is a 500lb Gloucester Old Spot pig.
Four times bigger than the pigs most butchers sell today, it's covered in a thick layer of fat - something Victorians prized as much as the meat.
It's sat on my knees.
By the end of the week, the Sharps must sell every bit of this enormous beast, from the snout to the tail.
There we go.
Lovely! What a fat son of unmarried parentage.
The set-up might be basic, but it's a step back into Andrew's own family history.
Butchery has been in our family for many generations.
And times gone by, butchers were immensely more respected.
They were pillars of society.
In the modern world, Andrew can only teach butchery because his business went to the wall.
He's concerned that his son will grow up with little knowledge of the family business.
I think if times were different he would go into the meat trade, but he's seen me go down the pan and what career fulfilment is there in that? I don't want to be a butcher.
I want to be a barrister because I've come to the conclusion that butchers don't make any money and barristers do.
Andrew hopes running a Victorian butcher's will prove to his son the value of the family trade.
It will be a life experience for him.
He'll learn about more about my obsession.
He may not take up the obsession, but it will give him an insight and maybe he'll think differently.
Let's just shove it up a little bit.
If this is Andrew's way of showing Michael the joys of butchery, they're off to a rocky start.
That is the biggest pig I've ever seen in my life.
Lifting stupidly heavy things like that doesn't make you want to be a butcher.
- That is massive.
That ain't a pig.
- That is not a pig.
Even before the shops have opened, they're attracting attention.
Crazy.
But faced with a gigantic pig and no refrigeration, Andrew's focus is on getting their week's precious stock cut up and into the ice-box before it starts to go bad.
We're not in Victorian times where people would buy something that was almost rotten, so it's a lot more of a difficult ask.
The biggest, fattest bugger I've ever lifted for a long time.
Right, let's get the door shut, mate.
All the shopkeepers must cope with the most basic amenities.
Their main water supply is in the middle of the town square.
Come on, Raiff, hurry up.
That's the way, son.
Nigel and the boys have a huge amount to do if they're to get bread on the shelves by first thing tomorrow.
Have you checked how much water you're expected to put in your dough mix? Er, no.
He's never baked in his life, but he's ignoring the advice of Caroline, even though she's a master baker.
I'm trying to have enough to work with comfortably.
All right.
Well, I'm not going to Can we just do it the way we want to? Does it say how much flour we need? You need nine stone, 6lb of flour.
Flour was very expensive to mill in the 1870s, so the Devlins are baking with the cheapest option - coarse brown flour.
But even a basic loaf required a baker to be accurate about his ingredients.
We need some more flour.
No, no, we need more weight.
That's the problem.
No, we don't.
We need more flour.
Look.
I'll prove it.
Ah, right.
Good.
As well as coarse flour, Victorian bread was also made with animal fat.
You need to put your lard in.
And is that measured out? No.
If I can see them struggling and I know that there's an easier way to do it, I can't help but intervene.
I wouldn't put more salt in that if I But then, I'm not supposed to be interfering.
In a time before electricity, all bread-mixing was done by hand and it was back-breaking work.
This is really, really hard to knead.
And we're not even halfway through.
Remember, outside in.
That's it.
Outside in.
Long periods bent double, inhaling flour, meant that bakers were expected to die before they turned 40.
I don't believe this.
Even though I've been working this dough a good 20 minutes, turning it over, I keep coming across dry flour.
I'm a strong bloke - I've got arms like Popeye - and it still isn't enough.
He's used to watching Mum doing it, and Mum doing it perfectly.
And now it's his turn to have a go, you know, and twice as hard.
So I think he's finding it pretty hard.
With their grand opening set for first thing tomorrow, the shopkeepers are retiring to the rooms above their shops.
- Oh, I say! - This is wicked! - Quite nice, actually.
- Oh, my word.
Victorian shopkeepers often struggled to make a decent living.
It was common for families to all live together in one room Little Dorrit, you look lovely.
which led to some unusual sleeping arrangements.
- Oh! - How will we survive in there? - I wonder who's sleeping in here.
- You and Dad.
And for the butchers, the toilet facilities are pretty basic.
Oh! You've got to be joking.
No! Tomorrow, the people of Shepton Mallet are going to get their first taste of Victorian shops.
Blinding day.
An absolute corker, really.
Coming round the corner and first seeing the market square, seeing the shop with my name on top made me feel so proud.
I was really taken aback when I first came into the square and I saw my shop.
Absolutely amazing.
It just brings it home, really, that I am an actual trader in this market square.
But while everyone else beds down, Nigel is working through the night.
He's aiming to bake 50 loaves - 120 fewer than a similar Victorian baker's would make, but still not easy for a novice.
The Victorian era - tremendously hard work.
It was the worst night in the world.
I couldn't believe what I've been dumped into.
Today, the shopkeepers start trading.
And they all want their shops to capture the attention of the buying public.
Hopefully, this will draw people in.
I expect they'll all sit there and do this.
I'll hear this thing going all day, I expect.
- Does that look nice? - Get to work, wench.
In the grocer's, according to the Victorian rule-book, only men can be seen in the front of house, so Debbie and Saffron are relegated to the back room, where they have to do all the prep, including creating their own tea blend.
But whilst the rest of the street is grafting, Nigel's just got to bed.
Turn the light off, please.
So it falls to the rest of his family to discover the results of his hard work.
He's done pretty well, except for the burnt part.
And that one and that one.
Just because it's burnt on the outside Doesn't mean it's not nice inside.
That's right.
And it means you can still eat it.
You can just cut that bit off.
It's far too salty.
I don't know how they'd eat this because you'd just have overloads of salt.
Oh, it really is very, very, very salty.
Sorry.
Nigel's only managed to make half of the 50 loaves he was aiming for and with these being burnt and salty, the Devlins face a dilemma.
What do we do? Do we not sell the bread? That's the thing.
Cos if they don't like it, they won't come back.
Back then, they wouldn't care what people think.
So we just sell it, Jack? We're Victorian bakers.
We don't have a conscience, so let's sell it.
OK, so they need to go in the baskets.
Put all the burnt things on top so then, like, you can't see that as much as these ones.
If it's burnt, it just means there's extra protein in there.
Yeah, say that to them.
I feel very anxious about this morning, but we just have to go with it now because people are waiting outside.
But the town square isn't exactly teeming with potential customers.
Most of the residents of Shepton Mallet do all their shopping at the retail park just up the road.
The Victorian shops' challenge is to lure them back.
To help them get started, the Chamber of Commerce has persuaded some brave locals to dump the supermarket and shop only in the Victorian shops for the entire week.
I'm very apprehensive, actually.
I really don't know what to expect.
I'm really worried about going in that butcher's shop.
I actually have got no idea how I'll cope.
When you think about it, you realise that not all the produce will be there.
It's time to open now, so out the back, please.
OK, let's get going.
- Hello.
Good morning.
- Morning.
Wow.
Look at all the bread! I have no idea what they'll sell that I would want to buy now.
- Morning.
- Good morning.
There's not a lot on offer.
- Morning.
- Morning.
Would you like to come in? Interesting.
At the baker's, Nigel's bread isn't getting a great reaction.
They're a bit more well done, those ones, aren't they? Some people like well-done bread.
- Bread made with lard, is it? - Yes.
- What's lard? - D'you really wanna know? It's like the fat off meat, basically.
- It's meat fat.
- Yeah.
Nice.
Still fancy it? There's hardly any loaves and half of them were burnt.
Then to see it had lard in it - I was a bit alarmed about that.
Caroline's dream to bring fresh-baked bread back to the high street isn't panning out too well.
There was just this kind of uncomfortable.
This is a really, really harsh lesson for us because we are selling rubbish, really.
- Have you got any fresh fruit? - I'm afraid I haven't.
- You don't do mayonnaise? - No.
- How about crisps, then? - I have no crisps.
But I can sell you potatoes if you'd like to make some.
In the grocer's, Karl is struggling, too.
I have to say I am concerned about the biscuits.
- Are they not stale? - No, they're fresh in every morning.
- Chestnut mushrooms? - I have no mushrooms, I'm afraid.
- Can I ask why? - Because I haven't.
No, I'm sorry.
- Some eggs, please.
- How many would you like? A dozen, please.
Even when Karl does have something in stock, it needs to be weighed out and packaged.
While the men in the front have to wrap sweets, weigh tea and package marmalade it's just as hectic out back.
It tires your arms out.
The girls need to fulfil orders for roasted coffee and packaged butter.
And the queues of shoppers are growing.
- It takes longer than you think.
- It does.
It's not pre-packed.
The man's very friendly and can't do enough for you, but the fact is it's taking ages.
We've been waiting for five, ten minutes now, maybe even fifteen.
It's very long.
We thought we could go straight over there and buy something.
So it's getting really kind of annoying.
This is unbelievably hard.
I don't know how these poor buggers did this in the old days.
You don't do sauce - tomato ketchup or sauce? No sauce, I'm afraid.
Sun cream, 30 factor.
Across the square, the butchers probably have the biggest challenge luring customers to their shop.
Victorian butchers used their meat as advertising.
In a time when people liked to smell and touch their food to check its freshness, butchers would create grand displays of meat outside their shops.
Andrew and Michael have decided to attempt something similar.
Modern trading laws mean they must use cured meat - rather than their fresh pig - for display, but this still brings problems in the height of summer.
Fly fest, it's called.
But that's how it would be.
The shop front is certainly attracting the attention of the locals.
It does not look very nice.
No, I don't like that.
- Don't like that.
- That's why I want to be a vegetarian.
But Andrew isn't stopping with the window display.
Any vegetarians, don't worry about it.
So was the pig.
It never ate a human in its life.
Victorian butchers weren't just shopkeepers.
They were showmen.
And it was common for them to butcher meat out on the street for the entertainment of passers-by.
A bit of hock.
Make a bit of soup.
My keen and able assistant, my son, is driving me to death to make sure we sell it all, so don't forget to get your hands in your pockets.
But Andrew's got his work cut out, trying to sell every part of the pig.
Ears make great chews, so you can boil them.
As there's only a limited time they can keep the meat out of the cold room, for Michael, Victorian butchery involves a lot of running up and down stairs.
- Can I have a leg? - Ooh.
Only a slice of the leg.
A few customers are slowly starting to buy the cuts they recognise.
- Erm, £6, please.
- Thank you.
But other parts of the pig are proving to be a hard sell.
We've got lungs and heart.
It's not normal trading, by any stretch of the imagination.
Two doors down and blacksmith Simon has attracted quite a crowd into the ironmonger's, too.
Feel free to browse round the shop.
Anything you're interested in, let me know.
Anything you want to talk to me about.
The shops are all out to make a profit, and while they'll be asking Victorian prices Two shillings.
they'll be charging the customers in modern money.
That's £10.
Ooh! What would you use these for? Simon's discovering the difference between browsing and buying.
These are mole-traps.
They've got a spring.
D'you make a slightly larger version that I could use for the kids? It seems that the only customers who really need his services are the other Victorian shopkeepers.
You want something to lighten yourself while you're working? Yes.
To light the room up.
Would you be able to make a bread-knife? Or have you got something to sell us? I'm not sure I've got any in stock, but I can make one.
Have you got any hooks that we can buy, please? What sort of hooks do you want? - Erm, all kinds.
- Not a problem.
We aim to please.
We can do that.
With a list of orders from his fellow shopkeepers, Simon leaps at the opportunity to shut up shop and spend time at his forge.
- Phwoar.
- Morning.
That feels better.
Yes.
At the baker's, Nigel's woken up to discover there's another problem with his bread.
- This was - I can see what the problem is.
You can see we've got a real problem here.
The oven was far too hot, to be honest.
What has happened is it's burnt on the outside - And it's just completely - Yeah.
But, starting to think more like Victorian traders, they won't let undercooked bread stop a sale.
We're learning to improvise.
We're advising people that they can bake it off when they get home.
They've been baked quite softly, so if you want to be able to bake them through so they're a bit crustier, straight into the oven So you could take it back and put and finish it off.
Clever idea.
At the forge, Simon is working hard to fulfil his orders.
There we go.
The full butcher's dozen.
I'm sorry about the delay.
Things have been really hectic.
- Oh, Simon.
- They should last you a lifetime.
I am impressed, actually.
They look really strong.
- Superb.
- Knife.
Hand-made.
To order.
- Look at that.
- Shilling.
Shilling.
While Simon's managed to meet the needs of his fellow shopkeepers, even a Victorian head-torch Don't set my hair alight, son.
he hasn't been able to serve in his shop.
I'm really sorry.
Are you waiting for me? I was called away on another job.
But this time, he's finally making some sales.
- How much is that? - Let me just consult my price list.
£29.
60.
- Yup.
I'll buy that.
- Lovely.
It's made me realise that I really need to advertise for some help.
I can't cope with running this business and the blacksmith's shop on my own.
After a disastrous first day baking, Nigel and Jack are off to seek some advice on how to make the perfect Victorian loaf.
There we are.
OK.
So, Nigel, if you would do the same.
They've come to learn from Stephen Oxford, whose family has run a bakery since Victorian times.
That's it.
That's the way.
But beyond baking techniques, Stephen's got some revelations about how a Victorian baker would make their ingredients go further.
It goes against everything my family's fought for for the last 100 years, but the bakers were under such pressure to get the best price for their loaf that they would do pretty much anything.
Profit margins were incredibly tight.
To stretch costly flour as far as possible, they would add all sorts of nasty ingredients - everything from clay to plaster of Paris, sawdust, chalk and, worst of all, alum - the same stuff we use to clean swimming pools today.
Although it's the most poisonous, it was pretty much the best ingredient a baker could use because it had both bulking qualities and also was a bleach for the flour.
Stephen's baked up some typical Victorian loaves, adulterated with sawdust and plaster of Paris.
One, two, three Have you ever licked a wall before? That's what it tastes like.
Spread that with butter, a bit of jam, a bit of marmalade, - you'd perhaps just get by.
- Yeah.
Yeah.
No, you're quite right.
Well, Steve, it's interesting.
Do we go for reputation or do we go for profit? - Profit.
- I'm up for going for profit.
Profit.
D'you want to sleep at night? Nigel and Jack might be sold, but convincing Caroline is a different matter.
- Chalk, rice - Sawdust.
- Sawdust.
- In our bread? I know it doesn't sit very well with you, but from what we've just done today, we've lost a lot of money.
It's a question of how we get that back.
But we'll lose a lot of customers.
Remember what I said.
I think what we should try and do here is just bake a small sample of the bread with some of the stuff, like I say, we learnt today, and see how it goes.
Will you offer it to the customer as a cheaper bread? Absolutely not.
We need to keep the profit.
The customer need not know what we're doing.
Remember, this is Victorian England, OK? With each passing hour, there are more and more things that I'm less and less comfortable with in the Victorian era.
For artisan baker, Caroline, the realities of making ends meet in a 19th-century bakery are not what she'd imagined.
It's a It's just outside the way that we would be as bakers and traders.
We just wouldn't do it.
Nigel, too, is torn between Victorian profiteering and his modern-day morals.
Talking it through with Caroline, there is only so far we will go in terms of adulteration of the bread we sell.
However, erm, we're going to use rice.
It's a good example of how you can use what is a natural ingredient but still, if you like, lower the value of the bread.
- 1 st July.
- 1 st July 1870.
Karl is also discovering that his dream of 19th-century trading is a long way from the reality.
Life as a Victorian grocer is awfully, awfully long and awfully, awfully hard.
Anyway, I'm gonna go now and I'm gonna go to bed.
In just a few days, the shopkeepers will set up stall and run a Victorian market in the square.
But for this to have any chance of success, they'll need to win over more customers before then.
At the butcher's shop, Andrew and Michael have a new plan.
Sausages were the perfect way for Victorian butchers to sell off every part of an animal.
Making them was a spectacle people would gather to watch.
- That's the intestines, yeah? - Have they just minced the meat? Running a shop is a bit like being in a theatre, so you have your stage and off you go.
- That's intestine? - Yeah.
It's been cleaned.
The invention of the mechanical sausage-mincer in 1865 made it much easier for butchers to fill a pig's small intestine with meat.
That is one hell of a sausage.
And, just as it was 150 years ago, it's still a crowd-pleaser today.
We got a round of applause after we'd finished making the sausage.
It was quite strange, actually.
The sausages are flying off the shelves, so Andrew decides to push his luck The last time I had a pig's foot I was 16.
selling pig's trotters.
Cheap as chips, mate.
Thank you very much.
The butchers made a killing with their sausage sales.
£186.
- We haven't done too bad, have we? - Not that bad a business.
In the grocer's, Karl also seems to be getting the hang of 19th-century shopkeeping.
What can I help you with? - What was you looking for? - Tea.
Queues are building up, but he's going to deal with them as a Victorian grocer.
If you order tea, we've got our own blend.
It will be delivered to your house.
Home delivery isn't just the preserve of online superstores.
In the Victorian era, every shop would deliver even the smallest order to customers' homes.
I would like half a dozen eggs, please.
A pound of potatoes.
A pound of onions.
A few bushels of carrots, please.
Having the food delivered means I don't have to carry bags of stuff.
That Yeah, that makes huge sense.
It's going really well now and people are accepting it.
It's quite good.
So far, no-one's gone, "What you doing?" They've all taken to it quite well, so maybe it'll work out better than I thought.
It's a success.
They've cleared all the customers and taken their money.
But now they have to make sure to deliver everything on time and that still means packaging it all by hand.
Remind me what's to be done.
You said you were doing that, so I thought it was all part of one job.
It's not down to me to remind you.
No lip, remember.
Victorians.
Shut up and do as you're told.
It's very important to get the service right, how it was in the old days.
It's very important so I'm gonna try and get it right.
I'm dressed like it, the environment's like it.
Let's do it right.
At the baker's, it looks like Nigel's old-fashioned Victorian skulduggery has done the trick.
There are rows of tasty-looking loaves, bulked out with rice.
But it's the bread from yesterday that the customers want to talk about.
We erm We bought this bread from you yesterday.
It's inedible, really.
I mean you needed a glass of water, really, to eat it, really.
It was so, so salty.
I'd be frightened to give this to the birds.
The salt may be an acquired taste that we could get used to, but the doughiness is not.
I can't sort of feed this to my boys every single day.
I don't think it's cooked properly.
It's a bit doughy.
- And also way too much salt in it.
- Yes.
D'you think we could have our money back? Would you like another brown loaf to try? I don't know.
This looks rather nice.
Two pounds of white with rice.
Mm.
Is Would that be OK to swap and have that? I think that would be acceptable, yes.
With customer after customer returning their bread, the Devlins are having to give away all their new stock in exchange.
We have to accept that today is going to be another loss-making day because we're going to have to try and make things right with people.
Chamber of Commerce member, Tom, the owner of a successful chain of bakeries, has decided to come to the rescue.
Tom's brought something to help boost the Devlins' flagging sales - new flour.
The arrival of giant industrial roller-mills in the 1880s meant that fine white flour became much cheaper - It's finer.
Check that out.
- That's very fine.
Wow.
Wow.
which made it easier to bake better-tasting bread.
You're going to have to at least double what you make in order to recoup any of the loss that's been made.
When we've got a whole load of new bread and products you can really go for it.
On the back of that we can hit Market Day running.
You're gonna have to.
He didn't mince his words and told us that we were basically one step away from our children going to the workhouse.
Which was a real punch in the gut, real punch in the gut.
At the forge, Simon is also getting ready for Market Day.
You're doing all right.
Yeah, absolutely fine.
He's hired himself an apprentice who, in Victorian Britain, would have simply been called "Boy".
I started his training today in the forge and I think he'll shape up really well.
He'll be a great asset to my business.
Despite having someone who could run his shop, Simon's decided to put all his faith in hand-made products.
Nice and slowly.
Let it sink in.
Whilst Boy makes candles, Simon is crafting candlesticks.
We're both at the forge and the shop is closed, so the shop's not making us any money today, but I'm hoping that we can recoup that by getting the boy here to produce all these candles and, hopefully, we'll manage to recoup some of our losses.
In the grocer's, 19th-century storage solutions have Karl worried about his food's shelf life.
- Hello.
- Good afternoon.
Chamber of Commerce historian, Juliet, has come to pay a visit.
Would a Victorian grocer sell the wares that are gonna perish by the next day? Would they have sold them off cheap at the end of the day? Yes.
There's no such thing as a sell-by date.
Frankly, you sell what you could get away with.
So the original dodgy geezer was a Victorian.
I have to tell you that the Victorian grocer, not only would he have been out for profit and shaved anything off that he possibly could, but he would have done some pretty dodgy practices.
A lot of them would have watered down their milk a bit.
Watered it down? Literally? - But Victorian water was horrible.
- Yeah.
Victorian grocers went further even than bakers when it came to food tampering.
This stuff- I won't suggest you touch it - is red lead.
Red Gloucester cheese - it would have been added to that.
Then you've got this iron sulphate.
You might have added it to pickles to make them look greener.
- You're beginning to look pale, Debbie.
- I'm so shocked.
I couldn't believe they could do something like that.
And that was only the start.
They would also spruce up old vinegar with sulphuric acid, add poisonous Prussian blue to tea leaves and mix mercury with children's sweets to enhance their colour.
Having long idolised the Victorian era as a much purer time for food, it's quite a shock for Karl.
I didn't have a clue what sort of practices they did.
Lead.
Prussian blue.
Iron sulphate.
I'm just completely amazed.
But whilst Karl comes to terms with Victorian dodgy dealing, there are deliveries to be made.
It's 7 pm and Harry is only just hitting the road.
And Victorian transport isn't high-speed delivery.
- Evening.
- What time do you call this? I do apologise.
It's been a very busy day.
It's a pity because I was hoping the delivery would have been earlier cos the stuff we ordered, we were gonna cook tonight.
- Sorry.
- Bit too late, unfortunately.
But despite the slow service, the spirit of the Victorian high street is starting to infect the people of Shepton.
It's that little bit of a personal touch that, you know, you know that somebody cares.
They know how much you need and they bring it to your door.
I love that.
After the hard, long day I had to get on a horse and cart and deliver x amount of goods to quite a lot of people.
It took bloody ages.
With Market Day only 24 hours away, the traders' biggest chance to make money is rapidly approaching.
Though it upset Victorian street traders, when Market Day came round shopkeepers also took their products onto the street to make extra cash.
And the modern-day shopkeepers are determined to do the same.
The bakers are using their new flour to produce lots of white bread.
And Simon's finishing his candlesticks in the forge.
There is a market for these in the 21 st century.
Definitely.
But while the other shopkeepers are busy crafting goods, Karl's got bigger plans.
How are we going to move that? I think Karl's lost his official title as Le Grand Fromage.
We're gonna get this cheese out of here somehow.
As a publicity stunt, he's ordered a giant two-ton cheddar.
It's so heavy, even the pulley system hasn't worked.
The original big-cheese stunt was dreamt up by Victorian grocer, Thomas Lipton.
When the giant cheese was delivered to his Glasgow shop it caused a riot and sold out in a couple of hours.
There'll be plenty of cheddar going cheap tomorrow, guys.
That's it.
Whoa.
Done.
Well done.
Thank you.
Cheers.
Now we've got to try and flog it.
Somehow.
I can't even take this seriously at all.
Ah.
Superb.
You look like a complete lemon.
Karl is turning to another retail technique pioneered by the Victorians - spectacular advertising.
Anybody interested in the world's largest cheddar? I've got the world's largest cheddar to sell.
Starts 9am tomorrow at the market.
Are you interested in the world's largest cheddar? I'm selling the world's largest cheddar tomorrow at the market! And it's not just the grocer saying "Cheese".
Right, if you could all remain still.
Like many Victorian traders, the shopkeepers are immortalising their place on the high street with a photograph.
Perfect.
Lovely.
Right, so if you can keep still for approximately 11 seconds.
Just look adoringly at your father.
No.
One.
Two.
Three.
Thank you.
You can relax.
- How'd you get on with no electricity? - I was so knackered, it didn't matter.
After a long day, the menfolk feel they've earned a visit to the local pub.
But at the butcher's, Andrew has to get his products ready for Market Day.
This pig's on its last legs.
It's fine.
It's fully all right, but it does need to get used.
Pure, unadulterated heart attack.
He's sinking all his remaining pig into a Victorian favourite - pork pies.
To cook them, he's using the baker's oven, which was common practice as most shops didn't have their own.
Well, we'll see.
- Andrew.
- Ah! Hey! Good evening.
And with his pies cooking, Andrew can't resist joining the others.
- Cheers.
- Cheers.
But with the baker and butcher both in the pub, no-one's kept an eye on the pies.
The pies are on fire! Sorry! Sorry.
You can't blame me.
I'm a woman.
I'm not meant to be in here.
Sorry.
I think there's a lesson to be learnt about going to the pub the night before Market Day to be learnt here.
The shopkeepers have now spent a week living the life of Victorians.
They've worked dawn to dusk and beyond.
Although it's been a great experience, I don't think I could live it forever.
But now they need one last big push.
Jack.
Jack.
Market Day has arrived.
- Yeah? - We have to get up, love.
One week ago, the town centre of Shepton Mallet was unloved by the locals and rarely visited.
Since then, the Victorian shopkeepers have worked hard to start drawing people back.
But have they done enough? Will anyone come to their market? We're going to just get our little bodies into action, get some theatre going.
Right, if we go and hang these up first.
Simon's stuck by his plan to sell hand-made goods and has produced over 170 candles, along with specially forged candlestick holders.
- How's that looking? - They don't look too bad, actually.
That'll bring the customers in.
The grocers, too, are putting together their display.
Rushing round at the last minute.
That's Karl exactly.
Come on, Saff, you come and give us a hand.
Take them down, make them look nice.
And then come back and get some trays of bread.
The bakers have finally mastered their craft.
With their new flour and another all-night session from Nigel they have rows of fresh white bread for sale.
So the stalls are set up, but will the Victorian goods sell to 21 st-century shoppers? In the butcher's, it's looking unlikely.
Oh, is this the? Oh, my God, look at that! - What's that meant to be? - Bit like a log! We'll take a miss on the pies.
Oh ho! It tastes nice, so it isn't quite as bad as it might seem.
Mm, yeah, but it is a disaster, yeah.
World's largest cheese! Out on the square, the Victorian publicity machine is in full flow and people are starting to roll up.
- There you go.
- Debbie, this one's for a quid.
I'm gonna home with a few bob in my pocket today.
Somebody has told us to try your new white bread, so I It's a new, roller-mill flour that we've managed to get hold of and we're really pleased.
The bakers' bread is flying off the stall.
OK.
We should have made tons more.
Tons more.
We needed to sell 60 loaves, at least, today to break even, I think.
The Chamber of Commerce - Greg, Juliet and Tom - have returned to see the effect the Victorian shops have had on the town.
Brilliant.
This is wonderful.
- Ladies.
Ladies.
Ladies.
- Welcome to Shepton Mallet, Mr Wallace.
Nice.
Thank you.
What is it about this shopping experience that you don't normally get? It's seeing so many people that I know that I can talk to while I'm here.
That doesn't happen with a supermarket cos you're dashing in, dashing out, going off to do something else.
That's exactly what I was hoping would happen.
Does anybody not know about my cheese? Please come and get it now.
Hurry up.
Hurry up.
He's He's got a big queue for this cheese.
This is stealing the show at the market.
I know.
I'm Thomas Lipton of the 18th century now.
Me.
But I've done it in 2010 instead.
While the rest of the shopkeepers profit, the butchers are desperate to get in on the act and flog the last parts of their pig.
Their solution is a classic Victorian recipe - pease pudding - a working-class favourite made with boiled yellow split peas, and pork.
Pease pudding hot, pease pudding cold, pease pudding in the pot, nine days old.
This, in Victorian times, is our first fast food.
And Andrew's showmanship seems to be doing the trick.
I mean, look at the butcher's shop! That is That is just magnificent.
It's just right for a Sunday lunch.
There you go, sir.
- Don't you get a spoon? - Oh, yeah, they're extra, sir.
I really like that.
Really salty.
Absolutely beautiful.
I want the recipe.
Ironmonger, Simon, has put his faith in hand-made and it seems to be paying off.
His candles are selling like hot cakes.
Thank you ever so much, dear.
Thank you.
It's absolutely wonderful, the relationship between the customer and the shopkeeper.
You sort of feel that you're the most important person in the shop.
It's really, really lovely.
What about the shopping experience? How does that differ from your? Shepton Mallet's seen nothing like this.
Shepton Mallet - back on the map.
It's brought it back to life.
The town has come alive.
Everybody was shell-shocked to start with and looking from the corners of windows, but as it goes on, as you can see today, more and more people are coming out and wanting to experience it, wanting to be part of it.
For the first time in many years, this market square is once again the centre of the community.
The shopkeepers have begun to bring people back to their town centre.
But have they managed to make any money? Let's get down to the most important thing, I think, and that's how much money these people took.
The baker's taken £347 and most of that was today at the market.
I think they had a tremendous battle.
They had real difficulties at first.
It took them time to rise to the challenge, but they've done pretty well, really.
It's been a fantastic learning curve.
And to end on a high note like this has been brilliant, absolutely brilliant.
Now, the ironmonger's taken £692.
54.
Apparently, he went on to sell the grate.
- So our ironmonger has taken £1,000.
- Yeah.
- That's not bad.
- That's not bad.
Got a little er Got a little present for you.
- There you are.
- That's fantastic.
Proprietor of your own 1870 ironmonger's.
That is fantastic.
I'm bowled over.
- Isn't that great? - Thanks ever so much.
You've put a lot into this, mate, haven't you? I'm just overwhelmed.
I'm absolutely overwhelmed.
The thing here, in this era in particular, is you're much more valued for what you can do.
He'll eat beautifully.
The butcher's only taken £352, which I think, when you look at the amount of interest in front of his shop Sort of a Marmite love-hate thing.
People loved it or loathed it.
But it got a response.
It was a bloody big pig and we have sold so much of it, it is quite unbelievable.
Stick it in the fridge for a year, it'll be fine.
The grocer has taken over £1,300.
A big Market Day for the grocer.
Queues down the street.
Big success.
The Victorians weren't such a rosy and honest bunch as we all think.
I'm a bit shocked, really.
I never realised how bold they were.
I never expected, in the business side of things, that they'd actually be quite so so roguish.
We've enjoyed it, working together, Michael and I, because we understand each other.
This has been something that'll live with both of us forever.
I enjoyed it, and erm and it has been fun.
It's brought us together in terms of a working relationship in ways that we never had before.
I don't think our working relationship is quite gonna be the same in the future.
It was a show of Devlin strength.
Absolute family strength.
We just got on and we just did it.
And we had an energy that just brought people to the stall.
And I Just incredible.
Its high street was once its heart and soul.
Not any more.
But what if we could turn back time to the days of the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker? A group of shopkeepers and their families are leaving the 21 st century behind.
You are going to discover what the high street was really like.
Your aim is to make this town fall in love with its high street again.
"Sell, sell, sell.
" Every week, they'll be living and trading through a different era - Lift it.
from Victorian to Edwardian Rabbits.
Pheasants.
through peacetime and wartime the Swinging '60s to the shocking '70s.
100 years of high street history.
It's absolutely magical.
Can they sell the products of the past to 21 st-century customers? Oh, the poor creatures.
I wouldn't give this to the birds.
Pimpin'.
And can they make a profit? This is unbelievably hard.
I don't know how they did this in the old days.
If I'm really being honest, I hate it.
The journey begins at the birth of the modern high street The pies are on fire.
Sorry! as the shopkeepers graft from dawn till dusk.
What a fat son of unmarried parentage.
Can they persuade the town to love its high street once more? I wish shopping was like this every day.
Four shopkeepers and their families are leaving their 21 st-century lives behind.
Kitted out in Victorian finery, they're on their way to Shepton Mallet in Somerset.
Shepton's once-thriving town centre, like so many in Britain, stands empty and unloved.
The horrible truth is Shepton Mallet's dying.
Online shopping and an out-of-town retail park have left many of its shops empty.
It makes me feel very, very sad and depressed, really.
But all that's about to change.
In Shepton's historic market square, four empty shops have been turned back to the key trades of the Victorian era.
An empty clothes store has been transformed into a 19th-century grocer's.
It will be run by delicatessen owners from Lincolnshire, the Sergison family.
Nothing will faze me.
It's what I do for a living anyway.
I'm just going back in times.
That's the crack.
I think.
We'll find out.
A closed-down bakery has been returned to its original purpose.
It's now a Victorian baker's, complete with wood-fired bread oven.
And taking it on will be artisan bakers from Wales, the Devlins.
I'm feeling a bit apprehensive at the moment, but excited, too, and really, really looking forward to it.
But I've got butterflies.
There's not just a grocer's and baker's, but a candlestick-maker's, too - a derelict shop is now an ironmonger's.
Modern-day blacksmith, Simon Grant-Jones, knows he has his work cut out.
It will be difficult to start with, but I'm confident I can win over the people of Shepton Mallet.
Finally, no Victorian high street was complete without a butcher's shop.
Andrew Sharp and son, Michael, from Cumbria, come from a long line of butchers, going back to Victorian times.
Now they get to see if they can hack it in the world of their ancestors.
We'll be all right.
A lot of knowledge and a bit of blag, we'll be fine.
The families have no idea what they're in for.
They're about to enter a world of dawn-till-dusk graft, where practically everything they sell must be crafted by hand.
And making sure they stick to the ways of Victorian traders will be their very own Chamber of Commerce.
Gregg Wallace isn't just a judge on MasterChef- he's a successful greengrocer with 20 years' experience who knows all the pitfalls of retail.
He is joined by historian, Juliet Gardiner, and fifth-generation baker, Tom Herbert.
This is it.
That's our town.
This is our big experiment.
The loss of the high street is a loss for the whole community.
We want to see if we can get that back.
This is just like a dream come true.
I'm going to see history brought to life.
The Victorian era was when the modern high street was born.
Market traders moved into shops.
But at a time when trading regulations were largely ignored, there were few rules and only one goal - to sell, sell, sell.
With the market square ready, it's time for the Chamber of Commerce to lay down the challenge ahead.
Welcome to the Victorian high street.
This is where you are going to be working and living for the next week.
You are truly going to discover what the Victorian high street was really like.
Victorians would have grabbed any opportunity to sell.
We obviously expect you to do the same.
The end of the week is market day - a brilliant opportunity to clear your stock.
We want you ready for business at nine o'clock tomorrow morning.
Ladies and gentlemen, off to your shops.
Good luck.
The families open for business first thing tomorrow.
They all have the same aim - to bring the people of Shepton back to the town centre and make their shops as profitable as possible.
The grocer's was a cornerstone of the fledgling Victorian high street.
At a time when it was difficult to keep food fresh, most people would visit every day.
The Sergison family - Karl, Debbie, Saffron and Harry - are the first to discover what's in store.
It's wicked.
- Very nice.
This is quality.
- Gosh.
Pickled onions.
Angelica.
What's that? I don't know.
"The best gift to a sick friend is Bovril.
" I do like our grocer.
He is the archetypal wide boy.
Got my butter pats and I'll be able to shape and make my butter.
If he can't sell, no-one can.
They're gonna love him.
Ooh! Jesus wept! He looks like a grocer - prosperous before he starts.
He looks like he's eaten the profits.
Sugar.
Being surrounded by Victorian produce is a dream come true for the Sergisons.
In the modern world, Karl and Debbie run a delicatessen in Spalding, Lincolnshire.
Karl and I have got a great partnership because I make it, he sells it.
There's your change.
Thank you very much.
Karl is a very good salesman.
You know, he could sell ice to the Eskimos.
Fancy a little cake with that, maybe? The grocer's back in the Victorian times, I feel, was the hub of the high street, hub of the community.
And it would be nice to get that sense of community back.
Karl has also long held a romantic view of the Victorians' approach to food.
The high street nowadays is not as good as it used to be, I think.
As you can tell, we make a lot of the stuff ourselves.
We try and re-create what was back in the old days.
19th century, early 20th century, things were a lot purer and had more naturalness.
While they might be delighted with their pre-packed goods, the reality is that most of their stock awaits them out back in sacks of basic ingredients.
What's up there? We've got yellow split peas, onions and potatoes.
Let's get the split peas to stay up there.
Before they can sell it, they'll need to weigh, mix, churn and even roast, as well as wrap everything by hand.
I think it's absolutely fantastic.
We've got all the kit we need to actually make a fair little start and make some money.
Also hoping to attract the business of the people of Shepton is the Victorian pork butcher's.
Look how well placed the butcher is.
You can't miss it.
- That's prime, isn't it? - It's a prime site.
They might have a good location, but Sharp & Son are less impressed with the fixtures and fittings.
I think we've established everything's pretty basic.
That's the thing you're gonna use the most, son, as butcher's boy.
On your hands and knees, scrubbing the floor like I used to have to do.
Yeah, yeah.
I feel like Florence Nightingale.
And without electricity or refrigeration, Andrew and Michael will have to rely on something more basic to preserve their meat.
Ah! Ice.
Butcher's ice was often imported from Norway and only delivered twice a week, so keeping meat fresh was a constant struggle.
It won't give us as much chilling as you would like.
We'll have to flog it quick.
The bakery is equally low-tech.
Oh, wow, this is a bit different.
All these baskets have to be filled up.
Hugely important in the 19th century, bakers' bread provided up to 80% of some people's diet.
Wow.
That's an oven, all right.
Already fired up, as well.
- Come and see this, guys.
- There's no taps.
- Where do we get the water from? - What? There's no aids at all.
Everything is going to be manual.
Very, very hard work.
I can see it already.
In their modern lives, Caroline and Nigel run a successful bakery together in Wales.
My role in the business is very different to Caroline's.
If you see Caroline very much as the baker, front of house, I'm very much back-office.
Caroline's Bakery is somewhere where she's in charge, completely and utterly.
I go in there at my peril at the wrong time.
And Caroline sees running the Victorian bakery as the perfect opportunity to bring proper fresh bread to the town.
I just love creating good bread.
I think we've lost that in society.
I'm really hoping that I can persuade local people to buy fresh bread again.
But as they read through the manual left for them by the Chamber of Commerce, the Devlins are in for a shock.
"The role of the baker was strictly a man's job during the Victorian era.
Female bakers were extremely rare.
" Oh, my God.
"Females in the family may assist in the running of the bakery, but should not get involved with the main bread-making activity.
" It's gonna be difficult, you and I working together, because our roles at home are completely different.
- They're totally reversed.
- Exactly.
No time to waste.
If they want bread for tomorrow morning at nine o'clock, we have to start the process.
I admire your enthusiasm.
Really, I do.
My biggest concern is the ironmonger.
The others are food.
We're used to buying food.
- But who shops in an ironmonger's? - Who needs a mole-trap? Would people even know what an ironmonger was? Oh, my God.
How am I gonna make any money on this? This is all a load of old tat.
The only people who'll be interested in buying this are collectors and people who don't know what they're looking at.
That's the best place for that.
The ironmonger's was a one-stop shop for every Victorian household need.
But blacksmith, Simon, won't just be running a shop.
As a Victorian ironmonger, he will also have to run a fully functioning forge.
This is fantastic.
Look at this old anvil.
Beautiful.
A perfect opportunity for the modern-day blacksmith who yearns to bring respect back to his craft.
Oh, this is absolutely the business.
He's going to be able to make things for the other shopkeepers - scales and scoops and that sort of thing.
I bet he comes into his own, servicing the others.
I can make some money out of this.
I can actually make some money with this.
I could make the gates for Buckingham Palace with this.
12 hours to opening and the butcher's stock has arrived.
Could you not have got us a bigger one? Are you feeling strong, lad? This is a 500lb Gloucester Old Spot pig.
Four times bigger than the pigs most butchers sell today, it's covered in a thick layer of fat - something Victorians prized as much as the meat.
It's sat on my knees.
By the end of the week, the Sharps must sell every bit of this enormous beast, from the snout to the tail.
There we go.
Lovely! What a fat son of unmarried parentage.
The set-up might be basic, but it's a step back into Andrew's own family history.
Butchery has been in our family for many generations.
And times gone by, butchers were immensely more respected.
They were pillars of society.
In the modern world, Andrew can only teach butchery because his business went to the wall.
He's concerned that his son will grow up with little knowledge of the family business.
I think if times were different he would go into the meat trade, but he's seen me go down the pan and what career fulfilment is there in that? I don't want to be a butcher.
I want to be a barrister because I've come to the conclusion that butchers don't make any money and barristers do.
Andrew hopes running a Victorian butcher's will prove to his son the value of the family trade.
It will be a life experience for him.
He'll learn about more about my obsession.
He may not take up the obsession, but it will give him an insight and maybe he'll think differently.
Let's just shove it up a little bit.
If this is Andrew's way of showing Michael the joys of butchery, they're off to a rocky start.
That is the biggest pig I've ever seen in my life.
Lifting stupidly heavy things like that doesn't make you want to be a butcher.
- That is massive.
That ain't a pig.
- That is not a pig.
Even before the shops have opened, they're attracting attention.
Crazy.
But faced with a gigantic pig and no refrigeration, Andrew's focus is on getting their week's precious stock cut up and into the ice-box before it starts to go bad.
We're not in Victorian times where people would buy something that was almost rotten, so it's a lot more of a difficult ask.
The biggest, fattest bugger I've ever lifted for a long time.
Right, let's get the door shut, mate.
All the shopkeepers must cope with the most basic amenities.
Their main water supply is in the middle of the town square.
Come on, Raiff, hurry up.
That's the way, son.
Nigel and the boys have a huge amount to do if they're to get bread on the shelves by first thing tomorrow.
Have you checked how much water you're expected to put in your dough mix? Er, no.
He's never baked in his life, but he's ignoring the advice of Caroline, even though she's a master baker.
I'm trying to have enough to work with comfortably.
All right.
Well, I'm not going to Can we just do it the way we want to? Does it say how much flour we need? You need nine stone, 6lb of flour.
Flour was very expensive to mill in the 1870s, so the Devlins are baking with the cheapest option - coarse brown flour.
But even a basic loaf required a baker to be accurate about his ingredients.
We need some more flour.
No, no, we need more weight.
That's the problem.
No, we don't.
We need more flour.
Look.
I'll prove it.
Ah, right.
Good.
As well as coarse flour, Victorian bread was also made with animal fat.
You need to put your lard in.
And is that measured out? No.
If I can see them struggling and I know that there's an easier way to do it, I can't help but intervene.
I wouldn't put more salt in that if I But then, I'm not supposed to be interfering.
In a time before electricity, all bread-mixing was done by hand and it was back-breaking work.
This is really, really hard to knead.
And we're not even halfway through.
Remember, outside in.
That's it.
Outside in.
Long periods bent double, inhaling flour, meant that bakers were expected to die before they turned 40.
I don't believe this.
Even though I've been working this dough a good 20 minutes, turning it over, I keep coming across dry flour.
I'm a strong bloke - I've got arms like Popeye - and it still isn't enough.
He's used to watching Mum doing it, and Mum doing it perfectly.
And now it's his turn to have a go, you know, and twice as hard.
So I think he's finding it pretty hard.
With their grand opening set for first thing tomorrow, the shopkeepers are retiring to the rooms above their shops.
- Oh, I say! - This is wicked! - Quite nice, actually.
- Oh, my word.
Victorian shopkeepers often struggled to make a decent living.
It was common for families to all live together in one room Little Dorrit, you look lovely.
which led to some unusual sleeping arrangements.
- Oh! - How will we survive in there? - I wonder who's sleeping in here.
- You and Dad.
And for the butchers, the toilet facilities are pretty basic.
Oh! You've got to be joking.
No! Tomorrow, the people of Shepton Mallet are going to get their first taste of Victorian shops.
Blinding day.
An absolute corker, really.
Coming round the corner and first seeing the market square, seeing the shop with my name on top made me feel so proud.
I was really taken aback when I first came into the square and I saw my shop.
Absolutely amazing.
It just brings it home, really, that I am an actual trader in this market square.
But while everyone else beds down, Nigel is working through the night.
He's aiming to bake 50 loaves - 120 fewer than a similar Victorian baker's would make, but still not easy for a novice.
The Victorian era - tremendously hard work.
It was the worst night in the world.
I couldn't believe what I've been dumped into.
Today, the shopkeepers start trading.
And they all want their shops to capture the attention of the buying public.
Hopefully, this will draw people in.
I expect they'll all sit there and do this.
I'll hear this thing going all day, I expect.
- Does that look nice? - Get to work, wench.
In the grocer's, according to the Victorian rule-book, only men can be seen in the front of house, so Debbie and Saffron are relegated to the back room, where they have to do all the prep, including creating their own tea blend.
But whilst the rest of the street is grafting, Nigel's just got to bed.
Turn the light off, please.
So it falls to the rest of his family to discover the results of his hard work.
He's done pretty well, except for the burnt part.
And that one and that one.
Just because it's burnt on the outside Doesn't mean it's not nice inside.
That's right.
And it means you can still eat it.
You can just cut that bit off.
It's far too salty.
I don't know how they'd eat this because you'd just have overloads of salt.
Oh, it really is very, very, very salty.
Sorry.
Nigel's only managed to make half of the 50 loaves he was aiming for and with these being burnt and salty, the Devlins face a dilemma.
What do we do? Do we not sell the bread? That's the thing.
Cos if they don't like it, they won't come back.
Back then, they wouldn't care what people think.
So we just sell it, Jack? We're Victorian bakers.
We don't have a conscience, so let's sell it.
OK, so they need to go in the baskets.
Put all the burnt things on top so then, like, you can't see that as much as these ones.
If it's burnt, it just means there's extra protein in there.
Yeah, say that to them.
I feel very anxious about this morning, but we just have to go with it now because people are waiting outside.
But the town square isn't exactly teeming with potential customers.
Most of the residents of Shepton Mallet do all their shopping at the retail park just up the road.
The Victorian shops' challenge is to lure them back.
To help them get started, the Chamber of Commerce has persuaded some brave locals to dump the supermarket and shop only in the Victorian shops for the entire week.
I'm very apprehensive, actually.
I really don't know what to expect.
I'm really worried about going in that butcher's shop.
I actually have got no idea how I'll cope.
When you think about it, you realise that not all the produce will be there.
It's time to open now, so out the back, please.
OK, let's get going.
- Hello.
Good morning.
- Morning.
Wow.
Look at all the bread! I have no idea what they'll sell that I would want to buy now.
- Morning.
- Good morning.
There's not a lot on offer.
- Morning.
- Morning.
Would you like to come in? Interesting.
At the baker's, Nigel's bread isn't getting a great reaction.
They're a bit more well done, those ones, aren't they? Some people like well-done bread.
- Bread made with lard, is it? - Yes.
- What's lard? - D'you really wanna know? It's like the fat off meat, basically.
- It's meat fat.
- Yeah.
Nice.
Still fancy it? There's hardly any loaves and half of them were burnt.
Then to see it had lard in it - I was a bit alarmed about that.
Caroline's dream to bring fresh-baked bread back to the high street isn't panning out too well.
There was just this kind of uncomfortable.
This is a really, really harsh lesson for us because we are selling rubbish, really.
- Have you got any fresh fruit? - I'm afraid I haven't.
- You don't do mayonnaise? - No.
- How about crisps, then? - I have no crisps.
But I can sell you potatoes if you'd like to make some.
In the grocer's, Karl is struggling, too.
I have to say I am concerned about the biscuits.
- Are they not stale? - No, they're fresh in every morning.
- Chestnut mushrooms? - I have no mushrooms, I'm afraid.
- Can I ask why? - Because I haven't.
No, I'm sorry.
- Some eggs, please.
- How many would you like? A dozen, please.
Even when Karl does have something in stock, it needs to be weighed out and packaged.
While the men in the front have to wrap sweets, weigh tea and package marmalade it's just as hectic out back.
It tires your arms out.
The girls need to fulfil orders for roasted coffee and packaged butter.
And the queues of shoppers are growing.
- It takes longer than you think.
- It does.
It's not pre-packed.
The man's very friendly and can't do enough for you, but the fact is it's taking ages.
We've been waiting for five, ten minutes now, maybe even fifteen.
It's very long.
We thought we could go straight over there and buy something.
So it's getting really kind of annoying.
This is unbelievably hard.
I don't know how these poor buggers did this in the old days.
You don't do sauce - tomato ketchup or sauce? No sauce, I'm afraid.
Sun cream, 30 factor.
Across the square, the butchers probably have the biggest challenge luring customers to their shop.
Victorian butchers used their meat as advertising.
In a time when people liked to smell and touch their food to check its freshness, butchers would create grand displays of meat outside their shops.
Andrew and Michael have decided to attempt something similar.
Modern trading laws mean they must use cured meat - rather than their fresh pig - for display, but this still brings problems in the height of summer.
Fly fest, it's called.
But that's how it would be.
The shop front is certainly attracting the attention of the locals.
It does not look very nice.
No, I don't like that.
- Don't like that.
- That's why I want to be a vegetarian.
But Andrew isn't stopping with the window display.
Any vegetarians, don't worry about it.
So was the pig.
It never ate a human in its life.
Victorian butchers weren't just shopkeepers.
They were showmen.
And it was common for them to butcher meat out on the street for the entertainment of passers-by.
A bit of hock.
Make a bit of soup.
My keen and able assistant, my son, is driving me to death to make sure we sell it all, so don't forget to get your hands in your pockets.
But Andrew's got his work cut out, trying to sell every part of the pig.
Ears make great chews, so you can boil them.
As there's only a limited time they can keep the meat out of the cold room, for Michael, Victorian butchery involves a lot of running up and down stairs.
- Can I have a leg? - Ooh.
Only a slice of the leg.
A few customers are slowly starting to buy the cuts they recognise.
- Erm, £6, please.
- Thank you.
But other parts of the pig are proving to be a hard sell.
We've got lungs and heart.
It's not normal trading, by any stretch of the imagination.
Two doors down and blacksmith Simon has attracted quite a crowd into the ironmonger's, too.
Feel free to browse round the shop.
Anything you're interested in, let me know.
Anything you want to talk to me about.
The shops are all out to make a profit, and while they'll be asking Victorian prices Two shillings.
they'll be charging the customers in modern money.
That's £10.
Ooh! What would you use these for? Simon's discovering the difference between browsing and buying.
These are mole-traps.
They've got a spring.
D'you make a slightly larger version that I could use for the kids? It seems that the only customers who really need his services are the other Victorian shopkeepers.
You want something to lighten yourself while you're working? Yes.
To light the room up.
Would you be able to make a bread-knife? Or have you got something to sell us? I'm not sure I've got any in stock, but I can make one.
Have you got any hooks that we can buy, please? What sort of hooks do you want? - Erm, all kinds.
- Not a problem.
We aim to please.
We can do that.
With a list of orders from his fellow shopkeepers, Simon leaps at the opportunity to shut up shop and spend time at his forge.
- Phwoar.
- Morning.
That feels better.
Yes.
At the baker's, Nigel's woken up to discover there's another problem with his bread.
- This was - I can see what the problem is.
You can see we've got a real problem here.
The oven was far too hot, to be honest.
What has happened is it's burnt on the outside - And it's just completely - Yeah.
But, starting to think more like Victorian traders, they won't let undercooked bread stop a sale.
We're learning to improvise.
We're advising people that they can bake it off when they get home.
They've been baked quite softly, so if you want to be able to bake them through so they're a bit crustier, straight into the oven So you could take it back and put and finish it off.
Clever idea.
At the forge, Simon is working hard to fulfil his orders.
There we go.
The full butcher's dozen.
I'm sorry about the delay.
Things have been really hectic.
- Oh, Simon.
- They should last you a lifetime.
I am impressed, actually.
They look really strong.
- Superb.
- Knife.
Hand-made.
To order.
- Look at that.
- Shilling.
Shilling.
While Simon's managed to meet the needs of his fellow shopkeepers, even a Victorian head-torch Don't set my hair alight, son.
he hasn't been able to serve in his shop.
I'm really sorry.
Are you waiting for me? I was called away on another job.
But this time, he's finally making some sales.
- How much is that? - Let me just consult my price list.
£29.
60.
- Yup.
I'll buy that.
- Lovely.
It's made me realise that I really need to advertise for some help.
I can't cope with running this business and the blacksmith's shop on my own.
After a disastrous first day baking, Nigel and Jack are off to seek some advice on how to make the perfect Victorian loaf.
There we are.
OK.
So, Nigel, if you would do the same.
They've come to learn from Stephen Oxford, whose family has run a bakery since Victorian times.
That's it.
That's the way.
But beyond baking techniques, Stephen's got some revelations about how a Victorian baker would make their ingredients go further.
It goes against everything my family's fought for for the last 100 years, but the bakers were under such pressure to get the best price for their loaf that they would do pretty much anything.
Profit margins were incredibly tight.
To stretch costly flour as far as possible, they would add all sorts of nasty ingredients - everything from clay to plaster of Paris, sawdust, chalk and, worst of all, alum - the same stuff we use to clean swimming pools today.
Although it's the most poisonous, it was pretty much the best ingredient a baker could use because it had both bulking qualities and also was a bleach for the flour.
Stephen's baked up some typical Victorian loaves, adulterated with sawdust and plaster of Paris.
One, two, three Have you ever licked a wall before? That's what it tastes like.
Spread that with butter, a bit of jam, a bit of marmalade, - you'd perhaps just get by.
- Yeah.
Yeah.
No, you're quite right.
Well, Steve, it's interesting.
Do we go for reputation or do we go for profit? - Profit.
- I'm up for going for profit.
Profit.
D'you want to sleep at night? Nigel and Jack might be sold, but convincing Caroline is a different matter.
- Chalk, rice - Sawdust.
- Sawdust.
- In our bread? I know it doesn't sit very well with you, but from what we've just done today, we've lost a lot of money.
It's a question of how we get that back.
But we'll lose a lot of customers.
Remember what I said.
I think what we should try and do here is just bake a small sample of the bread with some of the stuff, like I say, we learnt today, and see how it goes.
Will you offer it to the customer as a cheaper bread? Absolutely not.
We need to keep the profit.
The customer need not know what we're doing.
Remember, this is Victorian England, OK? With each passing hour, there are more and more things that I'm less and less comfortable with in the Victorian era.
For artisan baker, Caroline, the realities of making ends meet in a 19th-century bakery are not what she'd imagined.
It's a It's just outside the way that we would be as bakers and traders.
We just wouldn't do it.
Nigel, too, is torn between Victorian profiteering and his modern-day morals.
Talking it through with Caroline, there is only so far we will go in terms of adulteration of the bread we sell.
However, erm, we're going to use rice.
It's a good example of how you can use what is a natural ingredient but still, if you like, lower the value of the bread.
- 1 st July.
- 1 st July 1870.
Karl is also discovering that his dream of 19th-century trading is a long way from the reality.
Life as a Victorian grocer is awfully, awfully long and awfully, awfully hard.
Anyway, I'm gonna go now and I'm gonna go to bed.
In just a few days, the shopkeepers will set up stall and run a Victorian market in the square.
But for this to have any chance of success, they'll need to win over more customers before then.
At the butcher's shop, Andrew and Michael have a new plan.
Sausages were the perfect way for Victorian butchers to sell off every part of an animal.
Making them was a spectacle people would gather to watch.
- That's the intestines, yeah? - Have they just minced the meat? Running a shop is a bit like being in a theatre, so you have your stage and off you go.
- That's intestine? - Yeah.
It's been cleaned.
The invention of the mechanical sausage-mincer in 1865 made it much easier for butchers to fill a pig's small intestine with meat.
That is one hell of a sausage.
And, just as it was 150 years ago, it's still a crowd-pleaser today.
We got a round of applause after we'd finished making the sausage.
It was quite strange, actually.
The sausages are flying off the shelves, so Andrew decides to push his luck The last time I had a pig's foot I was 16.
selling pig's trotters.
Cheap as chips, mate.
Thank you very much.
The butchers made a killing with their sausage sales.
£186.
- We haven't done too bad, have we? - Not that bad a business.
In the grocer's, Karl also seems to be getting the hang of 19th-century shopkeeping.
What can I help you with? - What was you looking for? - Tea.
Queues are building up, but he's going to deal with them as a Victorian grocer.
If you order tea, we've got our own blend.
It will be delivered to your house.
Home delivery isn't just the preserve of online superstores.
In the Victorian era, every shop would deliver even the smallest order to customers' homes.
I would like half a dozen eggs, please.
A pound of potatoes.
A pound of onions.
A few bushels of carrots, please.
Having the food delivered means I don't have to carry bags of stuff.
That Yeah, that makes huge sense.
It's going really well now and people are accepting it.
It's quite good.
So far, no-one's gone, "What you doing?" They've all taken to it quite well, so maybe it'll work out better than I thought.
It's a success.
They've cleared all the customers and taken their money.
But now they have to make sure to deliver everything on time and that still means packaging it all by hand.
Remind me what's to be done.
You said you were doing that, so I thought it was all part of one job.
It's not down to me to remind you.
No lip, remember.
Victorians.
Shut up and do as you're told.
It's very important to get the service right, how it was in the old days.
It's very important so I'm gonna try and get it right.
I'm dressed like it, the environment's like it.
Let's do it right.
At the baker's, it looks like Nigel's old-fashioned Victorian skulduggery has done the trick.
There are rows of tasty-looking loaves, bulked out with rice.
But it's the bread from yesterday that the customers want to talk about.
We erm We bought this bread from you yesterday.
It's inedible, really.
I mean you needed a glass of water, really, to eat it, really.
It was so, so salty.
I'd be frightened to give this to the birds.
The salt may be an acquired taste that we could get used to, but the doughiness is not.
I can't sort of feed this to my boys every single day.
I don't think it's cooked properly.
It's a bit doughy.
- And also way too much salt in it.
- Yes.
D'you think we could have our money back? Would you like another brown loaf to try? I don't know.
This looks rather nice.
Two pounds of white with rice.
Mm.
Is Would that be OK to swap and have that? I think that would be acceptable, yes.
With customer after customer returning their bread, the Devlins are having to give away all their new stock in exchange.
We have to accept that today is going to be another loss-making day because we're going to have to try and make things right with people.
Chamber of Commerce member, Tom, the owner of a successful chain of bakeries, has decided to come to the rescue.
Tom's brought something to help boost the Devlins' flagging sales - new flour.
The arrival of giant industrial roller-mills in the 1880s meant that fine white flour became much cheaper - It's finer.
Check that out.
- That's very fine.
Wow.
Wow.
which made it easier to bake better-tasting bread.
You're going to have to at least double what you make in order to recoup any of the loss that's been made.
When we've got a whole load of new bread and products you can really go for it.
On the back of that we can hit Market Day running.
You're gonna have to.
He didn't mince his words and told us that we were basically one step away from our children going to the workhouse.
Which was a real punch in the gut, real punch in the gut.
At the forge, Simon is also getting ready for Market Day.
You're doing all right.
Yeah, absolutely fine.
He's hired himself an apprentice who, in Victorian Britain, would have simply been called "Boy".
I started his training today in the forge and I think he'll shape up really well.
He'll be a great asset to my business.
Despite having someone who could run his shop, Simon's decided to put all his faith in hand-made products.
Nice and slowly.
Let it sink in.
Whilst Boy makes candles, Simon is crafting candlesticks.
We're both at the forge and the shop is closed, so the shop's not making us any money today, but I'm hoping that we can recoup that by getting the boy here to produce all these candles and, hopefully, we'll manage to recoup some of our losses.
In the grocer's, 19th-century storage solutions have Karl worried about his food's shelf life.
- Hello.
- Good afternoon.
Chamber of Commerce historian, Juliet, has come to pay a visit.
Would a Victorian grocer sell the wares that are gonna perish by the next day? Would they have sold them off cheap at the end of the day? Yes.
There's no such thing as a sell-by date.
Frankly, you sell what you could get away with.
So the original dodgy geezer was a Victorian.
I have to tell you that the Victorian grocer, not only would he have been out for profit and shaved anything off that he possibly could, but he would have done some pretty dodgy practices.
A lot of them would have watered down their milk a bit.
Watered it down? Literally? - But Victorian water was horrible.
- Yeah.
Victorian grocers went further even than bakers when it came to food tampering.
This stuff- I won't suggest you touch it - is red lead.
Red Gloucester cheese - it would have been added to that.
Then you've got this iron sulphate.
You might have added it to pickles to make them look greener.
- You're beginning to look pale, Debbie.
- I'm so shocked.
I couldn't believe they could do something like that.
And that was only the start.
They would also spruce up old vinegar with sulphuric acid, add poisonous Prussian blue to tea leaves and mix mercury with children's sweets to enhance their colour.
Having long idolised the Victorian era as a much purer time for food, it's quite a shock for Karl.
I didn't have a clue what sort of practices they did.
Lead.
Prussian blue.
Iron sulphate.
I'm just completely amazed.
But whilst Karl comes to terms with Victorian dodgy dealing, there are deliveries to be made.
It's 7 pm and Harry is only just hitting the road.
And Victorian transport isn't high-speed delivery.
- Evening.
- What time do you call this? I do apologise.
It's been a very busy day.
It's a pity because I was hoping the delivery would have been earlier cos the stuff we ordered, we were gonna cook tonight.
- Sorry.
- Bit too late, unfortunately.
But despite the slow service, the spirit of the Victorian high street is starting to infect the people of Shepton.
It's that little bit of a personal touch that, you know, you know that somebody cares.
They know how much you need and they bring it to your door.
I love that.
After the hard, long day I had to get on a horse and cart and deliver x amount of goods to quite a lot of people.
It took bloody ages.
With Market Day only 24 hours away, the traders' biggest chance to make money is rapidly approaching.
Though it upset Victorian street traders, when Market Day came round shopkeepers also took their products onto the street to make extra cash.
And the modern-day shopkeepers are determined to do the same.
The bakers are using their new flour to produce lots of white bread.
And Simon's finishing his candlesticks in the forge.
There is a market for these in the 21 st century.
Definitely.
But while the other shopkeepers are busy crafting goods, Karl's got bigger plans.
How are we going to move that? I think Karl's lost his official title as Le Grand Fromage.
We're gonna get this cheese out of here somehow.
As a publicity stunt, he's ordered a giant two-ton cheddar.
It's so heavy, even the pulley system hasn't worked.
The original big-cheese stunt was dreamt up by Victorian grocer, Thomas Lipton.
When the giant cheese was delivered to his Glasgow shop it caused a riot and sold out in a couple of hours.
There'll be plenty of cheddar going cheap tomorrow, guys.
That's it.
Whoa.
Done.
Well done.
Thank you.
Cheers.
Now we've got to try and flog it.
Somehow.
I can't even take this seriously at all.
Ah.
Superb.
You look like a complete lemon.
Karl is turning to another retail technique pioneered by the Victorians - spectacular advertising.
Anybody interested in the world's largest cheddar? I've got the world's largest cheddar to sell.
Starts 9am tomorrow at the market.
Are you interested in the world's largest cheddar? I'm selling the world's largest cheddar tomorrow at the market! And it's not just the grocer saying "Cheese".
Right, if you could all remain still.
Like many Victorian traders, the shopkeepers are immortalising their place on the high street with a photograph.
Perfect.
Lovely.
Right, so if you can keep still for approximately 11 seconds.
Just look adoringly at your father.
No.
One.
Two.
Three.
Thank you.
You can relax.
- How'd you get on with no electricity? - I was so knackered, it didn't matter.
After a long day, the menfolk feel they've earned a visit to the local pub.
But at the butcher's, Andrew has to get his products ready for Market Day.
This pig's on its last legs.
It's fine.
It's fully all right, but it does need to get used.
Pure, unadulterated heart attack.
He's sinking all his remaining pig into a Victorian favourite - pork pies.
To cook them, he's using the baker's oven, which was common practice as most shops didn't have their own.
Well, we'll see.
- Andrew.
- Ah! Hey! Good evening.
And with his pies cooking, Andrew can't resist joining the others.
- Cheers.
- Cheers.
But with the baker and butcher both in the pub, no-one's kept an eye on the pies.
The pies are on fire! Sorry! Sorry.
You can't blame me.
I'm a woman.
I'm not meant to be in here.
Sorry.
I think there's a lesson to be learnt about going to the pub the night before Market Day to be learnt here.
The shopkeepers have now spent a week living the life of Victorians.
They've worked dawn to dusk and beyond.
Although it's been a great experience, I don't think I could live it forever.
But now they need one last big push.
Jack.
Jack.
Market Day has arrived.
- Yeah? - We have to get up, love.
One week ago, the town centre of Shepton Mallet was unloved by the locals and rarely visited.
Since then, the Victorian shopkeepers have worked hard to start drawing people back.
But have they done enough? Will anyone come to their market? We're going to just get our little bodies into action, get some theatre going.
Right, if we go and hang these up first.
Simon's stuck by his plan to sell hand-made goods and has produced over 170 candles, along with specially forged candlestick holders.
- How's that looking? - They don't look too bad, actually.
That'll bring the customers in.
The grocers, too, are putting together their display.
Rushing round at the last minute.
That's Karl exactly.
Come on, Saff, you come and give us a hand.
Take them down, make them look nice.
And then come back and get some trays of bread.
The bakers have finally mastered their craft.
With their new flour and another all-night session from Nigel they have rows of fresh white bread for sale.
So the stalls are set up, but will the Victorian goods sell to 21 st-century shoppers? In the butcher's, it's looking unlikely.
Oh, is this the? Oh, my God, look at that! - What's that meant to be? - Bit like a log! We'll take a miss on the pies.
Oh ho! It tastes nice, so it isn't quite as bad as it might seem.
Mm, yeah, but it is a disaster, yeah.
World's largest cheese! Out on the square, the Victorian publicity machine is in full flow and people are starting to roll up.
- There you go.
- Debbie, this one's for a quid.
I'm gonna home with a few bob in my pocket today.
Somebody has told us to try your new white bread, so I It's a new, roller-mill flour that we've managed to get hold of and we're really pleased.
The bakers' bread is flying off the stall.
OK.
We should have made tons more.
Tons more.
We needed to sell 60 loaves, at least, today to break even, I think.
The Chamber of Commerce - Greg, Juliet and Tom - have returned to see the effect the Victorian shops have had on the town.
Brilliant.
This is wonderful.
- Ladies.
Ladies.
Ladies.
- Welcome to Shepton Mallet, Mr Wallace.
Nice.
Thank you.
What is it about this shopping experience that you don't normally get? It's seeing so many people that I know that I can talk to while I'm here.
That doesn't happen with a supermarket cos you're dashing in, dashing out, going off to do something else.
That's exactly what I was hoping would happen.
Does anybody not know about my cheese? Please come and get it now.
Hurry up.
Hurry up.
He's He's got a big queue for this cheese.
This is stealing the show at the market.
I know.
I'm Thomas Lipton of the 18th century now.
Me.
But I've done it in 2010 instead.
While the rest of the shopkeepers profit, the butchers are desperate to get in on the act and flog the last parts of their pig.
Their solution is a classic Victorian recipe - pease pudding - a working-class favourite made with boiled yellow split peas, and pork.
Pease pudding hot, pease pudding cold, pease pudding in the pot, nine days old.
This, in Victorian times, is our first fast food.
And Andrew's showmanship seems to be doing the trick.
I mean, look at the butcher's shop! That is That is just magnificent.
It's just right for a Sunday lunch.
There you go, sir.
- Don't you get a spoon? - Oh, yeah, they're extra, sir.
I really like that.
Really salty.
Absolutely beautiful.
I want the recipe.
Ironmonger, Simon, has put his faith in hand-made and it seems to be paying off.
His candles are selling like hot cakes.
Thank you ever so much, dear.
Thank you.
It's absolutely wonderful, the relationship between the customer and the shopkeeper.
You sort of feel that you're the most important person in the shop.
It's really, really lovely.
What about the shopping experience? How does that differ from your? Shepton Mallet's seen nothing like this.
Shepton Mallet - back on the map.
It's brought it back to life.
The town has come alive.
Everybody was shell-shocked to start with and looking from the corners of windows, but as it goes on, as you can see today, more and more people are coming out and wanting to experience it, wanting to be part of it.
For the first time in many years, this market square is once again the centre of the community.
The shopkeepers have begun to bring people back to their town centre.
But have they managed to make any money? Let's get down to the most important thing, I think, and that's how much money these people took.
The baker's taken £347 and most of that was today at the market.
I think they had a tremendous battle.
They had real difficulties at first.
It took them time to rise to the challenge, but they've done pretty well, really.
It's been a fantastic learning curve.
And to end on a high note like this has been brilliant, absolutely brilliant.
Now, the ironmonger's taken £692.
54.
Apparently, he went on to sell the grate.
- So our ironmonger has taken £1,000.
- Yeah.
- That's not bad.
- That's not bad.
Got a little er Got a little present for you.
- There you are.
- That's fantastic.
Proprietor of your own 1870 ironmonger's.
That is fantastic.
I'm bowled over.
- Isn't that great? - Thanks ever so much.
You've put a lot into this, mate, haven't you? I'm just overwhelmed.
I'm absolutely overwhelmed.
The thing here, in this era in particular, is you're much more valued for what you can do.
He'll eat beautifully.
The butcher's only taken £352, which I think, when you look at the amount of interest in front of his shop Sort of a Marmite love-hate thing.
People loved it or loathed it.
But it got a response.
It was a bloody big pig and we have sold so much of it, it is quite unbelievable.
Stick it in the fridge for a year, it'll be fine.
The grocer has taken over £1,300.
A big Market Day for the grocer.
Queues down the street.
Big success.
The Victorians weren't such a rosy and honest bunch as we all think.
I'm a bit shocked, really.
I never realised how bold they were.
I never expected, in the business side of things, that they'd actually be quite so so roguish.
We've enjoyed it, working together, Michael and I, because we understand each other.
This has been something that'll live with both of us forever.
I enjoyed it, and erm and it has been fun.
It's brought us together in terms of a working relationship in ways that we never had before.
I don't think our working relationship is quite gonna be the same in the future.
It was a show of Devlin strength.
Absolute family strength.
We just got on and we just did it.
And we had an energy that just brought people to the stall.
And I Just incredible.