Exit stage left

In order to eat and to eat well Cicero must from time to time visit one of the many supermarket chains that have today helped destroy the nation’s High St and which have rendered obsolete the local butcher, baker and candlestick maker.

Naturally he has a favourite but this is a medium that does not accept nor do product placement so the brand name, or even colours of said supermarket of choice, will not be divulged in these musings.

But through force of circumstance he had to use another brand this weekend. It was a chastening experience to see how others shop. But he also learnt something interesting. And this might explain a lot.

In this supermarket to indicate how chariots should leave the Chariot Park, there was a big sign and arrow marked ‘OUT’.

At Cicero’s food emporium of choice the customers are encouraged to leave via the exit. Clearly this is a supermarket that encourages speakers of Latin and readers of Cicero, Ovid and Livy.  An emporium which does not feel the need to talk down to its customers.

Cicero likes this.

It is also interesting to note that in the Dumb Down Supermarket there are lanes for those whose baskets contain ‘ten items or less’. This is grammatically incorrect and as well as targeting those who have not bothered to learn Latin, this is clearly a brand whose customers couldn’t give a damn about the correct use of English grammar, a language they are supposed to be native in.

Naturally Cicero’s chosen emporium, Educated Supermarket, knows what is right and wrong when it comes to English and its lanes are for those with ‘ten items or fewer’.

Surely everyone knows that it is fewer when you can count items individually. Hence ten items or fewer. But it is ‘less milk in my tea’. Cicero knows you know this.

It is also likely that Dumb Down Supermarket and its customers will struggle with the correct use of apostrophes, gerunds and gerundives and split infinitives but further investigation is required on these topics.

But here’s the thing.

Dumb Down Supermarket is struggling. It is attracting fewer customers and who are buying and spending less. Educated Supermarket is doing very well and going from strength to strength.

Is there a cause and effect at work here? Cicero thinks so.

So to succeed as a shop keeper these days in a market that is fiercely competitive, the strategy is simple-use Latin wherever possible and know your English grammar. This will show your breeding.

Have a great day.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus.