Milkmen/women

[Natator]

Re: Milkmen/women

When I was maybe 6 till about 8, during the school holidays, our awesome milkman, Doug, would take me on his rounds. We'd stop a couple of times for coffee at certain houses. He'd end up at the top of my little road a couple of hours later and drop me off again. He'd often let me have a block of Cadbury's during the round.

When I was 7 I went into hospital and when I got out he came to see me, with a Dinky (maybe Corgi) metal snow plough, which I cherished.

He was such a wonderful man, in his 50's or 60's at the time I imagine. I wish I had been able to meet him later in life and let him know how much his friendship meant to the little me.

The sad thing is if this happened today everyone would wonder why this guy made friends with a little kid. back then it just happened and was absolutely fantastic.

I also remember we used to leave flat stones on the top of the bottles, to stop the birds getting at the milk. That was my job on the round.

i now love in Australia, Queensland which is one of the hot bits. They have no idea what a milk float is as they never had them, as you could never leave milk out in this heat.

[darren]

Re: Milkmen/women

cant remember that when milkmen/women tried to sell bread but i do remember them coming quite early.

The clink of the bottles on your window sill and birds pecking the silver lids and sometimes getting ur milk nicked.

i suppose the milkmen etc just wanted to specialise on selling one product maybe too much work so they just specialised.

i likes "big women".....that tickled old ernie

do you remember when the milkmen tried to sell bread as well as milk, juice, eggs,......why that never caught on i don't know....seems a good idea now

[Richard1978]

Re: Milkmen/women

I remember my local milkmen offering more products in the late 1980s - early 90s. The parents of someone at school used to get their veg delivered with their milk.

Bottles of fizzy drink around xmas was another service, modern plastic ones rather than the deposit glass ones of the "Pop man".

[George 1978]

Re: Milkmen/women

I remember our milkman was called Fred or something like that - I think he worked for Co-op dairies, and going back further, we used to get bottles or orange juice from the milkman. The name Alpine springs to mind - and Sunquick orange juice.

[MalcolmAndSheldon]

Re: Milkmen/women

My dad was briefly a milkman, while two of my uncles were long-term milkmen. As a result, back in the 1980s - my early teenage years - I had frequent weekend and holiday employment as a milkie's gopher.

I loved it, even though the work could be long, dull and often freezing on account of the very early mornings. But it was precisely those very early mornings, often requiring a 4 am start (in one instance, a knackering 3 am!) which made it so interesting, as it gave me more than a glimpse of a world that very few people actually got to see. The thing that sticks in my mind the most was how much activity there was, in those wee early hours: night shift workers travelling to and from their places of employment; the dairy itself, bustling with clattering crates of milk bottles and the hum of departing floats; and - most fascinating of all - the local...eccentrics.

Five to seven am seemed to be prime time for the oddball squad, and one in particular: a large duffel-coated man who would run up and down a particular street yelling about his mother's underwear. To my thirteen year old self, shivering as I delivered the milk and fetched the empties while it was still quite dark, to be confronted by the sight of this behemoth charging up the road while bellowing about his mum's knickers was somewhat disconcerting. He was harmless enough, though - in fact, he didn't appear to be aware of much else other than the pavement ahead and whatever it was about his mother's dress habits which bothered him so.

In any case, regarding all the other stuff you could get delivered besides milk - yep, it was surprising how much you could order off the milkman in those days: orange and apple juice, soft drinks, eggs, yoghurt, bread, teabags, pots of cream. At one time, we delivered these plastic cocktail-style milkshake shakers, along with a selection of milkshake powders. Come Christmas, it would be all crates of fizzy drink, along with an additional round where the milkie delivered turkeys. I never had to do a turkey round, however - which I was thankful for, as I heard it was too bloody much like hard work, lugging those freezing great things around.

Ah, happy days...well, mornings. Okay, more like freezing cold nights, really.

[Twocky61]

Re: Milkmen/women

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[Twocky61]

Re: Milkmen/women

He was such a wonderful man, in his 50's or 60's at the time I imagine. I wish I had been able to meet him later in life and let him know how much his friendship meant to the little me.

The sad thing is if this happened today everyone would wonder why this guy made friends with a little kid. back then it just happened and was absolutely fantastic.

Sadly that is a sign of the times

At school we had a teacher Mr P who taught us maths. He would let us in his classroom at break/lunch times to watch TV & to socialise. He even invited us to his cottage at weekends where his wife would give us cake & pop

Sadly too,If he did this nowadays all sorts of allegations would be thrown at him

He was a nice guy

[Arran]

Re: Milkmen/women

They still have milkmen in my area but they deliver in bulk quantities to hotels and coffee shops rather than houses. They also deliver other things like juice and sugar.

In what year did milk deliveries to houses die as a mainstream business?

[Arran]

Re: Milkmen/women

It's quite common now for milk in glass bottles delivered by milkmen to be transported from hundreds of miles away in the bottles then the empty bottles are transported hundreds of miles back for refilling. There are very few dairies around in Britain which still use glass bottles so many that remain serve customers nationally rather than locally. The processing and bottling of milk and the delivery of milk have now become two completely separate businesses.

It's possible that much of the milk in glass bottles delivered by milkmen nowadays is not as fresh as the milk sold in supermarkets and could have come from even further away.

[Richard1978]

Re: Milkmen/women

My parents still have milk delivered from a local dairy farm.

[Arran]

Re: Milkmen/women

I have encountered several people over the years who used milkmen to buy silver top milk but later stopped using milkmen when the milk became homogenised because they could buy it cheaper in shops. There are still some smaller dairies that sell silver top milk but it's now a small and shrinking market as most people want cheap semi-skimmed and they can't compete with big supermarkets.

[George 1978]

Re: Milkmen/women

Yes, wasn't the milk that had the red and silver striped tops on, semi-skimmed? I remember our family fridge having that milk in.

[MalcolmAndSheldon]

Re: Milkmen/women

Yes, wasn't the milk that had the red and silver striped tops on, semi-skimmed? I remember our family fridge having that milk in.

Yep! The tops were as follows:

Silver - standard
Red and silver stripes - semi-skimmed
Blue and silver in a gingham style patten - skimmed
Gold - full fat

Homogenised and sterilised milk came in taller bottles with caps which needed a bottle opener, though I can't remember what colours were used to differentiate between the two.

[Arran]

Re: Milkmen/women

It's a bit confusing:

Red - homogenised. Same as blue top plastic.
Red and silver stripes - semi-skimmed homogenised. Same as green top plastic.
Silver - not homogenised. Not usually available in plastic bottles.

When did semi-skimmed become available from milkmen? Was it only available from larger dairies or did most smaller local dairies also sell it? I think red top homogenised milk started to replace silver top milk in the late 1990s.

[staffslad]

Re: Milkmen/women

We had a Co-op milkman up to about ten years ago, though I believe he was independent for the last few. We stopped it as the price difference was just too great compared to supermarket milk. I haven't seen him around for years now, so probably retired as he was getting on. It's a shame price killed it off. For the elderly and infirm he provided a valuable service which getting supermarket milk can't replace. It's another symptom of people becoming more and more isolated from those around them. Plus the end of the milkman and lonely housewife in a frilly nightie joke