UP CLOSE IN MALDON DISTRICT: We meet the owner of a brand new Burnham-on-Crouch shop opening this week

Everyone is finding it tough at the moment and wants life to get back to normal.

We will be profiling local independent businesses regularly over the coming weeks in a feature called UP CLOSE IN MALDON DISTRICT to help showcase our town centre and village traders. By spending locally, you help support local jobs - and so build our communities back stronger.

Today we talk to Rosie Flint, who will open her first shop - Daisy Roots - in Station Road, Burnham-on-Crouch on Friday (28 May).

IF it's one thing that one of Burnham's newest shop owners will have plenty of in stock – apart from a great selection of shoes and numerous items of school uniform and stationery, of course – it's resourcefulness, resilience and a real work ethic.

Rosie Flint, 32, will open Daisy Roots in Station Road, Burnham-on-Crouch, on Friday, 28 May – though she has decided to go for a full 'opening week' rather than a single day, as with the pandemic situation she wants to be sure that all her new customers get a chance to look round the shop properly and help her celebrate her very first week as a town centre trader.

Rosie had always thought she would like to have her own shop – but her personal journey through the Covid-19 pandemic finally gave her that push to do it.

"Having lived locally all my life – I finally bought my first house, completing on the first day of lockdown last year," Rosie explains, "my job was going really well. Then I was made redundant in October. I knew I had to do something as I have an 11-year-old daughter, Megan, and I'm a single parent."

Being a parent, one type of shop Rosie realised was missing from Burnham-on-Crouch was an independent shop selling shoes that included shoes for school, stationery and items of school clothing and kit.

"My plan is to sell reasonable quality at reasonable price," Rosie adds, "and to provide people with choice and the feel of a little independent shop. Some of the stationery is cheaper than Amazon."

The stationery, as with almost all other goods in the shop, is sourced by Rosie from UK suppliers, including a family-run firm that more than a century old.

The ethical feel doesn't end there – when Nub News catches up with Rosie, she's been busy refurbishing cable reels to make display stands for the shop. A local artist, Charlie Stafford, is painting the shop signage (you can find out more about Charlie's artwork on her Facebook page here) and Rosie has also been using Pipe Dreams, another UK firm that sells plumbing supplies that can be made into furniture, to create her new shop fittings. In her previous job Rosie managed a team of engineers specialising in kitchen extraction systems and it's easy to see she has a no-nonsense and industrious approach to life.

"It's really important that Megan sees you have to work in life," Rosie says, who smiles when she tells how Megan has been working hard on a tombola for customers who call into the shop during the opening week.

Rosie believes that another thing that has changed as a result of Covid-19 is attitudes to local town centres.

"I think people appreciate their local town centres and shops more now," she says, "and there's a stronger feeling of community and people helping each other where they can. I think it's a good time to be doing this."

Daisy Roots will sell lots of shoes - with something for everyone, a selection of basic school uniform items, stationery and accessories like water bottles, lunch boxes and school bags.

You can find the shop's FB page at the link here.

All pictures for this article were taken by Burnham-on-Crouch company, Shining Through Photography - you can visit the website using the link here.

The Keep it Local campaign is being launched through Maldon District Council's Sense of Place initiative, with funding from the Magnox Decommissioning Fund.