ARRIVING at Homer Hill, just outside Durham along a turnoff from the A690, you are greeted by a vision of professionalism. The main building, which houses a farm shop, kitchens and a cafe, looks smart and inviting; with a wood exterior in keeping with its rural setting.

A model cow overlooks a children’s play area and, although it is a weekday mid-morning, there are already several cars in the car park.

Inside, there is a counter full of all kinds of delicacies, where vivid red steaks sit alongside pale, plump chickens.

Further along from the butcher’s section, the shop has a greengrocer’s corner stocking local produce including honey and conserves, along with speciality foods. The cafe behind the shop serves only home-cooked food.

Homer Hill marks something of a departure for its owners the Haswells, who made their name as Sunderland butchers. Before opening the farm shop and cafe, they had no experience in running either type of business, yet as they approach five years of trading, they have seen the venture take off.

A year after launching, they extended the cafe to meet demand and the year after that, they extended the kitchens. The family has been granted planning permission to further extend the cafe, taking its capacity to about 160.

Jean Haswell smiles wryly as she recalls that Homer Hill was meant to represent a winddown.

“When my husband and I got to a certain age, we said to our daughters, ‘Right, what are we going to do?’. They said maybe we should get planning permission to turn the cattle shed into a farm shop. That was about six years ago and we opened this to make life easier. It just didn’t happen.”

Homer Hill is run by Glanville – known as Glan – and Jean alongside daughters Gillian Hide and Joanne Moran. At 73 and 71 respectively, Glan and Jean leave the business management largely to their children, and, while Gillian is responsible for hygiene and the farm shop, Joanne takes charge of the kitchen.

Coming from a farming background, the family prides itself on the quality of its meat, selling beef from its own herd of Belgian Blues and Aberdeen Angus. As Jean explains, farming and butchery are in the blood. “Glan’s great-grandfather was originally a farmer in Seaham and his grandparents opened Haswell’s butcher’s shop in Silksworth, Sunderland, in 1924. My people were poultry farmers.

“Glan was the butcher at Silksworth and I worked for my dad on the poultry farm, then I worked in the butcher’s shop. As well as running the shop, we had an outside catering business.

We were very well-known and we catered for the whole of the North-East.”

The family no longer has the Silksworth shop – with renovations needed and the market dwindling, the family sold it two years ago to concentrate on Homer Hill – but it has continued many of the traditional practices established there.

“Especially with the horse scare, I think the customer just wants quality and affordability, and that has been our ethos from day one,” says Jean. “People ask questions all the time,” adds Gillian. “They are quite knowledgeable. People can see the cattle in the field and in the shed.

We’ve got traceability on every animal.”

The butcher’s – including other locallysourced meat like turkey, pork and lamb – is undoubtedly a draw, with customers travelling to it from throughout the region. Following on from the Silksworth days, the Haswells still have a strong catering business, supplying the likes of Durham’s Fat Buddha restaurant, Number 4 tearoom in Sedgefield and Newcastle’s Royal Grammar School.

It is the combination of the butcher’s, cafe and farm shop, however, which has ultimately led to Homer Hill’s success, giving customers more than one reason to visit and encouraging them to prolong their stay.

“The people are lovely,” says Jean, who enjoys the fact that customers tend to linger. “There are three or four sets of people who are in every morning. We get a mixture of people but since we put the play area in two years ago, grans have come with their grandchildren.”

With the cafe extension looming, the Haswells hope to capitalise on their success serving everything from Sunday lunches to Joanne’s signature cakes. An advantage is having Peter Barker, who formerly worked at Seaham Hall, as a chef. “He’s worked at a Michelin-starred restaurant so he’s quite inventive,” says Jean.

One thing which looks unlikely is that Jean and Glan will be able to slow down anytime soon – but they wouldn’t have it any other way. “It’s just Glan’s life and I really like meeting the people,” says Jean. “Glan would just hate to retire.

We are still traditionalists but Gillian and Joanne do move with the times. It’s worked really well so far and hopefully it will continue.”

  • homerhillfarmshop.co.uk