"We had a keg of vinegar, same story, one brought in their own container," Bob said. "Prices were much cheaper in bulk. Fresh honey was sold in bulk during the war in 1945, it was 8 pence a pound with your own bottle or honey pot. There were no prices on grocery items so one had to remember them all in our heads. The only prices on things were items on display in our main front windows out the front and sometimes of something on special in the shop."

Bob recalls that 4lb of sugar was 1/6. He also remembered that there were wooden straight back chairs for customers, mostly ladies, to sit on whilst staff got their orders.

"The customer would bring in their shopping list and sit there reading out what they needed," Bob said. "So if they wanted Bon-Ami I had to run and get it, then the next item was read out, off I would go and often it was something near the Bon-Ami that it could have also picked up with that. But we didn't complain. They got a lot of exercise getting those groceries!"

Items were written up on a docket using "a pencil we used to carry behind our ears if it was not in use".

"All our store's groceries and other products were dispatched from the various suppliers, usually in Sydney, all on the goods train," Bob said. "Orders were usually placed monthly though there were times when things were short and could be ordered more often.

"We would have our railway van arrive at the Bathurst Goods Yard where Mr. Simpson would collect it and deliver the boxes and bags up to our store.

"There would then be a flurry to get it all unpacked and the store looking spick and span. We had a small storeroom at the rear but that really did not hold all that much but we managed."

Bob said the store had refrigeration for the bacon which the staff sliced up bacon with a big slicer. Butter was also kept in the large refrigerator.

"Butter arrived on the passenger train in specially made 56lb wooden boxes, sometimes wrapped in wet wheat bags to try to keep it cooler," he said.

"Sometimes it was starting to melt by the time it reached the store."

The arrival of an Army Camp on the outskirts of Bathurst meant more business.

"When the displaced persons arrived out at the old Army Cap on Limekilns Road we were really busy getting their orders ready," Bob said. "We got regular inspections from the head office in Sydney. After petrol rationing came in during World War Two the car the bosses from Sydney drove had a big gas bag on top.

"We did not sell fresh vegetables but sometimes we would buy, say granny smith apples, off a local orchardist and sell them out. Eggs were one line we did buy locally."

In all, Bob spent seven years with Moran & Cato before leaving to start his own milk run in about 1953.

Milk was being sold in glass bottles by that time. Each bottle had its own foil lid and handy for making Christmas decorations at school to put on their Christmas tree.

"I did all home delivery and sold mainly pasteurised milk but we had a few customers who didn't like this new fangled stuff so Dairy Farmers bottled them 'fresh milk' that had just been separated and not pasteurised," he said.

"I sold cream and flavoured milk also - chocolate and strawberry. We had to collect all the empty washed glass bottles and return them to Dairy Farmers for cleaning and refilling. I was able to pay off my business in three years."