GIVE ME A BREAK:SHOPPING ON Grafton Street is supposed to be an "event". You might come up from the country for the day to shop, or go there for an important purchase like an engagement ring. That's what I heard an advocate of Grafton Street traders saying on the radio last week.
The argument was that new traffic patterns that favour buses and discourage cars are preventing people from experiencing such event shopping, and encouraging them to use the big malls in the suburbs. So we decided to try it out. We visited one of those ancient, well-regarded shops where everything is in a glass case. The sort of place you’d buy an engagement ring in. It was an important anniversary, and while our budget was inadequate, we thought we’d have a look anyway, just for the fun of it.
Things just weren’t what they were in the days of the Diceman and those tiered plates of buns put on your table by staff in Bewley’s, where you’d sit over a milky coffee with your partner or friend and discuss the pros and cons of buying such and such a thing, which was 90 per cent of the enjoyment, along with the fact that either walking up or down Grafton Street you were bound to meet someone you hadn’t seen in ages.
Window shopping used to be a respectable past-time. The particular shop we visited for our “event” test used to be famous for it. The shop is the sort of old world place where a purchase used to be an experience to be anticipated, to be savoured and making several visits before a purchase would have been acceptable.
In the distant past, I’ve bought jewellery there for under €100 and always the men behind the counter were charming and seemed to give as much attention to the person looking for a pair of simple pearl stud earrings as they did to the money-bags looking for a pearl necklace with a diamond clasp.
But something has changed. Window shopping there last week, there was less willingness to take things out of the windows and the glass cases for our perusal. Now the window cases are too difficult to open and after showing us one item, the shop assistant advised us to consult the internet. All the goods and the prices were listed in cyberspace, we were politely told. In other words, you really shouldn’t be here if you haven’t done your research and, it wasn’t said, but looking at the cheaper items probably didn’t make us ideal customers. Well, if we’d wanted to window shop on the internet, then that’s what we’d have done. You can’t hold things on the internet. You can’t see their sparkle. You can’t feel the thing in your hand.
We got another sort of rejection in another shop. There was a dress that I knew I couldn’t afford, but shouldn’t one be allowed to try it on just in case of a Lotto win before Christmas? Window shopping is fantasy shopping, after all.
You’d think that a retailer would understand this, and that a proportion of the people that try on clothes may actually buy them.
“Do you have this in a size 14?” She looks us up and down. “The clothes are French and Italian. I don’t think we’d have anything to suit you.” Then she produces what one could only describe as a sack covered in bits that drape and fold like something you’d cover your sofa in. We won’t be shopping there again.
So, when Grafton Street complains about traffic laws, is that really the problem? I think it’s a great idea to have drivers park on the fringes and walk in to the centre, whether it’s Grafton Street or Henry Street. But the price of parking your car is extortionate, when in many suburban malls the parking is affordable or even free, and the malls have the same choice of shops.
Grafton Street used to be the last word in gentility – you were bound to enjoy a day out there. Nowadays, if you delay too long at a shop window you’re either accosted by someone looking for your loose change or frowned at for holding up the traffic.
It has lost its romance, plus you can get a fast-food meal or a mobile phone anywhere, you don’t need to go to Grafton Street for it. If you want to buy something unique, you’d be better off in a specialty shop in Galway or Westport or Kilkenny or Kenmare. The days are gone when visiting town to shop was an event and you can’t blame the new traffic rules for that.