Beddoes of Ironbridge: The Shop That Sold Almost Everything

For generations of people in and around Ironbridge, if you needed something unusual, the advice was to try Beddoes. The ironmonger's on High Street, later Beddoes & Son, builders' merchants, was run by the same family for more than a hundred years.

From 1871

A newspaper report published when the business was preparing to close says the shop was opened in 1871 by Frank Beddoes, grandfather of the last owner, Douglas Beddoes.

By 1891 the business was trading as F. G. Beddoes, "General & Furnishing Ironmonger", in High Street, Ironbridge. Photographs of the shop from this early period show a frontage packed with goods, with stock set out on the pavement as well as in the windows, and signs for the OFFICE and SHOW ROOMS above.

More than an ironmonger's

Records surviving from 1891 show that Beddoes offered goods on instalment arrangements to customers around the area. One agreement records a White hand sewing machine and cover, valued at £4 15s, supplied to Harriet Morrey of Church Row, Ironbridge.

Other agreements from the same records name customers in Madeley and Broseley, and goods including a mangle. They show that Beddoes served people well beyond Ironbridge itself, and that it allowed customers to spread the cost of fairly expensive household items.

Powder, fuse and dynamite

A business ledger from 1896 gives a good idea of how varied the trade was. Ordinary local orders sit alongside an entry for half a keg of powder.

Beddoes dealt in blasting powder, fuse and dynamite as well as domestic and general ironmongery, supplying the industrial and mining communities of the area. A receipt from the same year shows F. G. Beddoes subscribing to The Ironmonger, a trade publication, and a 1909 statement from Sinclair Iron Co. Ltd of Ketley, Wellington, addressed to F. G. Beddoes, Iron Bridge, gives a glimpse of the firm's suppliers.

Inside Beddoes

People who remember the shop tend to start with the same things. Ian Beddow remembers the pot-bellied stove and the distinctive smell of the store. David Green also remembers the fire in the middle of the shop. He recalls that if a customer asked for something obscure, staff would disappear upstairs and usually come back with one, sometimes having to dust it off first.

Chris Hughes remembers that his brother Ian worked at Beddoes.

Beddoes & Son

According to the newspaper report, William Beddoes took over the business in the 1920s, and Douglas Beddoes took over in 1963. By then the firm was trading as Beddoes & Son and also worked as builders' merchants, as the enamel sign for Blue Circle products shows.

The final years

The newspaper cutting reported that the family business had traded in Ironbridge for more than 100 years. Douglas Beddoes told the paper he would have kept the shop open for several more years had a new roundabout not been built on its doorstep.

He said the roundabout made it impossible for vehicles to stop outside the shop, and he blamed it for a considerable fall in trade.

Closure in 1983

Douglas said he regretted the closure and thanked the customers who had supported the business. The shop closed in 1983 when he retired, which his daughter, Lynda Gillespie, has confirmed.

Remembering Beddoes

Lynda remembers spending her summer holidays at the shop, sorting thousands of nails and screws.

Traci Dix-Williams remembers a door once kept at Blists Hill which was believed to have come from the back room of Beddoes, where paintbrushes had been cleaned. She recalls the accumulated paint being inches thick in places, with the individual layers visible where a corner had been cut away. The link with Beddoes is how she remembers it being described rather than something we have been able to confirm.

John Pib recalls a Beddoes order book being kept at Blists Hill, containing copies of orders to local companies. He particularly remembers a letter to a customer in Oakengates, posted on a Friday, telling them to expect delivery on Saturday morning.

More than forty years after the shop closed, people still remember its smell, its stove, its stock and the people behind the counter.