A LONG-established butcher’s business in Eve-sham has been reinvented to become a booming national online retailer, after a year of being hit by floods, the credit crunch and competition from supermarket giants.

Clare Lusted and her father Barry realised they had to take drastic action after their family business in High Street became deserted during last summer’s floods when surrounding streets were submerged under six feet of water.

Ms Lusted said: “Evesham was a ghost town. We were stranded at work, we looked at each other and just thought why don’t we really push this internet thing?

“The water didn’t come into our shop, but our customers were in caravans. They’d had to move out of their homes and who wants a freezer full of meat in a caravan?

“There was no barbecue season. Who wants a floating barbecue?”

As well as the floods, the business, which has been established for 25 years, was also hit by cut-price competition from supermarkets and spiralling fuel and parking costs. So the father and daughter sat down and launched the internet site clarebarry.co.uk Ms Lusted said: “We only sell meat from animals reared by UK farmers and we built up more than 2,000 customers in just five months after the floods.

“We still have strong local trade but we knew there was potentially a nationwide market for high quality meat and we were really keen to continue to support British farmers. We only buy our fresh meat and poultry from British farms and wholesalers and source our produce locally where possible.”

Now, Ms Lusted has overseen a rehaul of the website and is spearheading a new marketing push.

She said: “We’ve found that people want the convenience of a supermarket, but the quality of the local butcher.

“They are beginning to understand now that you can have fresh meat delivered and due to technological advances, its quality is not going to suffer in transit. Online meat trading is in its early years and many people still don’t yet understand it’s possible.

“Trust from customers can be an issue with a website, but we deliver what we say we will and customers come back.”