Webbs of Tenterden has been a cherished part of the local community since its beginnings in Sittingbourne in 1910, weathering challenges, including a devastating fire in 2013 and the recent pandemic. Will McGill took a trip down to the South East to check it out.
Webbs of Tenterden boasts a rich history that began in Sittingbourne in 1910, where the original ironmongery first opened its doors. The Tenterden shop has been a beloved fixture since the early 1960s, starting with an ironmongers, followed by a cookshop, and finally a linen shop.
In a dramatic turn of events, the cookshop tragically burned down in 2013. However, resilience shone through as the linen shop was relocated to the upper floor of the cookshop, complete with a lift for easy access. 
This transformation allowed Webbs to flourish, offering a delightful range of baby clothes, soft and wooden toys, luggage, and a variety of accessories for the bathroom, bedroom, and dining room. Today, Webbs stands as a testament to both tradition and innovation, continuing to serve the community with charm and character.
Webbs of Tenterden is owned and operated by the Webb family, with Mrs Webb currently managing the shop. The business has been passed down through generations, maintaining its commitment to quality and community service.
Q&A
Question (Q):How are things? How has business been?
Mrs Webb (MW): Things are going very well for us at the moment, we’ve been beginning to get our seasonal stock ready for both Halloween and Christmas which has bought in an influx of customers with many people already making a start on their Christmas shopping.
The Christmas season is by far our busiest and most profitable season in the shop with us being a go-to for many local people looking to get Christmas decorations, cards and gifts, as well as, making sure they’ve got all the kitchen equipment they need to host on the big day.
Q: Could you tell us about the ups and downs of the business?
MW: We are fortunate enough not to have had many ups and downs through the time the business has been running, although in 2013 the shop suffered significant damage from a fire which forced it to close for two years while it was reconstructed. Luckily the shop came out the other side of it, thanks to the massive support from the local community and by running a pop-up shop in the front section of our ironmongery store.
We struggled again when forced to close during the COVID lockdowns, but again with huge amounts of support from the locals we pulled through and managed to survive when a lot of businesses across the country weren’t so fortunate.
Q: Are you a member of any associations and do you attend any industry trade shows?
MW: We use both Bira and HomeHardware buying groups, and the main reasons behind this are that we can easily buy in bulk and also we get monthly discounts, and this is beneficial to us as a smaller business as it allows us to compete with larger chains. 
This year we attended both Top Drawer and Exclusively Housewares which we found very helpful for meeting up with reps of brands we already stock, and also discovering new products.
We used to attend the Spring Fair at the NEC Birmingham, but since COVID have decided to stick to the London trade shows which are easier for us to get to given our location. We found Exclusively Housewares particularly helpful as it is very much aligned with most of the catalogues of products we stock in our shop such as kitchenware, cookware, small electrical appliances and other home items.
Q: Who are your main suppliers? Which item lines sell well? Why do you think that is?
MW: We deal with a lot of big names in our different departments. We primarily get our kitchen and cookware from KitchenCraft, Dexam, Taylor’s Eye Witness, and Kuhn Rikon, our china from Portmeirion and Emma Bridgewater, and glassware from Dartington and Royal Scot.
While upstairs we supply Mayoral and Kite baby clothing, as well as JellyCat soft toys. All of these are big sellers for us, especially Emma Bridgewater and JellyCat which have quite big followings and bring in a variety of customers of all age ranges.
Another huge seller of ours in Wrendale Designs which we stock both their Portmeirion china range and their gift lines, the reason for these being such good sellers is probably the reasonable prices combined with the cute watercolour designs which are very popular particularly the woodland and farm animals which given our countryside location our customers tend to lean towards.
Q: Who are your main competitors? And how do you ensure customers choose you instead of rivals?
MW: We are lucky enough that we don’t have much direct competition in the town, but further afield our biggest competitors would be large department stores, some garden centres and also online retailers.
We ensure people choose us by offering a more personal and unique style of service to what you would expect to receive in most big stores. We are very hands on with our customers and try to ensure they receive the best service in finding what it is they need, and often if we don’t have what they want then and there we will offer to order it in specially for them if we can, as well as being able to post small items to people or locally delivering larger items in our van.
People regularly comment about how you don’t get service like ours much these days and that they like to come to us for that reason.
Q: How do you attract new customers?
MW: One of the main ways we actively try to attract new customers and remind local people that we are here is via social media, especially our Instagram and Facebook pages which we regularly post on with new seasonal stock as well as our everyday lines. We’re currently running a weekly segment on our Instagram called ‘What We Stock Wednesday!’ where each week we show off a different area of the shop.
Some of the other ways we attract customers include our window displays which we change every couple of months to display different or new stock, and where we are fortunate enough to be right on the high street. Many people walk and drive past it everyday. We are also fortunate that many of our loyal customers will often bring friends of theirs into the shop if they are visiting the area, which helps to spread our presence by word of mouth.
Q: What are the future plans for the shop?
MW: At present there aren’t any specific plans for the business, but our aim for the shop is always to keep a wide range of products which cater to our client base and change along with their demand. For example this year we have had a huge increase in the number of customers buying luggage from us so we’ve increased our stocks significantly and now provide a much larger range for people to choose from.
Q: What are the main problems of running the business in the industry today?
MW: One of the biggest problems we face is competing with online stores because they are able to have more of a variety of stock which they often buy in bulk meaning they can offer a cheaper price, which as an independent business we sometimes struggle with.
Fortunately we are located in an area where the demographic tends to prefer to buy from a physical shop rather than ordering online.
Another problem we face is the reliability of supply chains, lucky in recent months we haven’t had an issue with this, but in the past few years there have been a few times when orders we’ve placed have taken significantly longer than they should have, an example of this was back in 2021 when the Suez Canal was blocked.
Q: Is there anything else you’d wish to add?
MW: Generally we are incredibly grateful that we are still here and have as many lovely customers supporting us as we do. Not a day goes past when we don’t get compliments on how lovely our shop is and how there aren’t many shops like it around anymore.
