“She’ll be with you shortly, she’s just coming back from the castle”. This is not something you hear in your average pet shop but, then again, the Belvoir Barkery is not an average pet store.
Set in the grounds of the glorious and imposing Belvoir Castle on the Leicestershire/Lincolnshire border near the town of Grantham, the store is the newest addition to the Belvoir Retail Village and is part of a strategic step to make the castle estate a leading dog-friendly destination.
The castle is already a popular attraction in the area, with a rich royal history and a number of other features including an animal park with goats, ponies, donkeys and small animals. The estate as a whole is a regular dog-walking spot, and work is now under way to make the location even-more dog-centric with more water bowls and clip stations, and the creation of a 4km long dog-friendly nature trail for visitors to enjoy with their companions.
The retail village features stores selling premium clothes, homewares, ice creams and other food and drink, along with a luxurious farm shop selling goods sourced from the estate directly and the surrounding area, as well as other premium lines that fit the bill.
Amelia Palfreyman, the energetic head of retail at Belvoir Castle, has been in place since January and has already been busy with new outlets and store refreshes in the village. With a background in own-brand product development, she has plenty of experience in building ranges, hitting price points and creating the right product mixes, and does all the buying for the store.
The Belvoir Barkery pet store has only been open a matter of weeks, but it is already on a schedule to expand the scope of its operation. The upstairs room is not currently open to customers but will soon be filled with additional stock, and internal signwriting is already inviting people to journey up the stairs.
Amelia’s vision for the store is to create a gift shop for canine visitors, but to supplement the offer with a number of practical items such as coats and accessories.
Most of the products stocked are of high quality but a little unconventional, with prices kept as affordable as possible. Quirky and witty items include Petplex dog shampoo, a tongue-in-cheek tribute to the premium Olaplex hair care line, and a selection of coffee mugs with upbeat and reassuring messages for dog owners.
A range of soft toys, including some unusual lines imported from the US, feature in attractive baskets, which fit nicely inside raw wooden fixtures to match the pleasant flooring.
The broad shelving allows for a display of pet beds from a choice of suppliers, including some premium and some more affordable lines, while the small store also features a selection of blankets and drying towels, washing and grooming lines, food stations, feeding bowls, poop bags and hybrid devices with bags, as well as a choice of leads, coats and harnesses for visitors who might have met with a canine mishap on their day out.
A section of wall space is dedicated to prints by Jane Francis, a specialist animal artist who will immortalise a customer’s pet by appointment.
Treats and supplements already selling well, as are many of the novelty and nostalgic gifting lines.
“Products need to be stylish and have the right aesthetic for us,” explains Amelia. “But they need to be affordable too.”
Although the range is small compared to most pet stores, Amelia still has 35 suppliers to deal with. Because speed was of the essence when preparing for opening, the initial stockholding was arranged through specialist supplier Fayre, but there is a plan to expand the range of products available over time, including food lines.
Currently, raw food and natural treats from Cotswold Raw are stocked in a mini alcove in the farm shop as the logistics and space requirements of installing a freezer unit in the pet store were not feasible prior to opening.
Amelia maintains that the stores at the retail village already serve a band of regular local customers as well as visitors to the castle on a day out, and it is easy to see how both of these populations can increase over time as activities at the castle and on the wider estate draw more people in, and the Belvoir Barkery goes from strength to strength.
