Member Article

Boris Johnson’s cheesemonger ambitions and other celebrity retail dreams

Boris Johnson would open a cheesemongers if he had the opportunity to run an independent shop, while Gary Lineker would sell fruit and vegetables on a market stall like his father.

The celebrity ambitions are part of tongue-in-cheek research from ecommerce plaform Tictail and high street charity Retail Trust - as a play on the convention, “eveyone has a book in them.”

Political figures, sports stars and media personalities were asked to reveal what kind of store they would open, given the opportunity.

Carl Waldekranz, the 27-year-old Swedish founder of Tictail, said: “Napoleon might have been disparaging in his description of the British as a ‘nation of shopkeepers’, but over two hundred years on, retail ingenuity remains one of the things that foreigners most admire about the British.

“Over three million Britons work in retail and I am proud that Tictail is playing a part in maintaining this tradition by allowing thousands of British businesses and new entrepreneurs to take their first steps into ecommerce.”

Other celebrity’s retail dreams included Hilary Devery’s fancy to run a Homeware Shop; footballer and commentator John Barnes’ ambition to open a newsagent; Ed Miliband’s vision to open an independent bookshop; and illusionist Uri Geller’s dream to open a convenience store in his local town of Sonning.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Tom Keighley .