It’s hard to believe, but we opened our shop in September 1978! As we go into our 40th year in business we’d like to take a look back at what life was like when we opened.
The week we opened Billy Stark scored the only goal in a 1-0 win for St Mirren at Love Street. Jim Clunie, a former Saints player, was the manager at the time taking over from Sir Alex Ferguson who had moved to Aberdeen earlier in the year. Teams played for 2 points for a win in the league back then, Frank McGarvey was the Buddies top scorer in all comps and Saints reached the semi final of the Anglo Scottish Cup, losing on penalties to Oldham Athletic.
In 1978 the Ford Cortina was the UK’s most popular car costing around £1,000 brand new at the time.
Petrol prices at this time were 76.5p per gallon, and yes, we had halfpenny (“ha’pennies”) coins too!
1978 the Chrysler plant in Linwood, located at Phoenix centre as it is now, was the largest single employer in Renfrewshire with 9,500 staff, but would close only 3 years later.
Three Times A Lady by The Commodores was the number 1 song in the charts, Grange Hill and Dallas were new to the TV screens, while Grease, Superman and The Midnight Express were the top films to see at the cinema.