The new shop in Norwich Street, Fakenham – on the site of the toyshop which only recently closed. Apparently (and hopefully somebody in the know will correct me if I’m wrong) they’ll be selling army surplus gear, which sounds a tad obvious being as they’re called ‘Quartermasters’. Well, that’s a bit different anyway and better than having yet another baker/butcher/optician in the town centre. I hope they do well.

I know – I didn’t have to go far to take this snap as it’s right opposite my office door!

Appeal after Fakenham theft – News – Lynn News

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What do you reckon to this story in today’s EDP? Marston’s are a large Staffordshire-based brewery and pub company (they have over 1700 pubs across the UK). They own the Wychwood, Jennings, Banks’s, Brakspeare and Ringwood beer brands as well as high-street ‘cooking-lager’ brands  like Carlsberg, Stella Artois, Carling and Fosters.

They’re apparently looking at opening a bar & restaurant in the Clipbush Lane area, close to the proposed Health Centre complex.

Do we need it? Is an edge-of-town site good for our town?

Fakenham’s a small town. You’d think it would be easy to let everybody know when you had some news to tell. Unfortunately, I haven’t found that to be true over the years. We all seem to be involved with friends and colleagues in small groups and news doesn’t always escape into the outside world efficiently.

Newspapers like The EDP, Fakenham Times and The Fakenham Sun play their part. In fact they do a really great job in keeping us all informed. Trouble is, they can only ever print a limited snapshot of what’s going on at any one time and they don’t all pick up on the same information.  Also, there are lots of different people you need to contact when you have something happening and need to tell the world - and if your news is business related you may not be able to reach your target audience easily.

When Kick Start Fakenham held its first tentative meeting over a year ago, I mentioned the fact that there was no central point of information distribution. No single place you could go to make sure that your news reached the right people. At the time, it looked like Kick Start might provide that central point, but their website is still to be published and if the truth’s known, they’re probably finding the same old problems themselves when they need to get their info published.

So, I’ve come up with something myself. It will be launching soon

Am I obsessed with food and drink lately? Maybe I am, but this is no time to go into denial – there’s some Fakenham food & drink blogging to be done…

A new restaurant is about to open in Newmans Yard, off Norwich Street. D’Inacios Brasserie will serve its first dishes next Wednesday (5th May). Coffees during the day in the courtyard (don’t you just love that wisteria?) with a la carte lunches and a sophisticated-sounding menu in the evenings.

Intriguingly, the leaflet I was just handed in town says, “Fine Wines, Ales & Food”, so it’ll be interesting to see how they approach their beer menu. You’re advised to book – their number’s 01328 851247. Tell ‘em you saw it here on the Fakenham Blog and I may be able to blag some kind of discount when I drop in to check them out

It’s very pleasant inside The Oak, in Oak Street Fakenham. The staff are always helpful and friendly and even manage to put up with the banter from my mate with a cheery smile (we’ve been in there enough to be recognized now). Last night I dropped in for a meal and a pint with two pals after working late at the office – it was around 7.45 when we arrived.

The menu was in a state of flux (a new list of dishes was arriving next day) . Many dishes were ‘off’ but we managed to make a choice from what remained – my mate and I both went for a liver and onion suet pudding (I know – it sounds unusual) and his partner chose a fish dish. After being told subsequently that only one liver pudding existed, my mate chose the fish too. We didn’t have to wait long for it all to arrive, as there were only a few people in the place. I’ve never seen it choc full.

The liver & onion pudding (avec les chips ‘n’ peas) was fine, if a tad strong tasting. Maybe because it was beef liver (as we were informed). The fish dishes came served in a creamy sauce along with a single bowl of chips to share, which had been requested instead of mashed potato. Strangely no vegetables arrived to go with them, despite being included in the description we found afterwards. The desserts were fine, I was told (I didn’t have one myself) so overall the food was OK but not ideal. I’ll let them off though, due to the menu thing. Maybe next time I’ll try the Mexican Fajita Tower they were planning to introduce on the new menu. That does sound nice!

The beer: Us fellas had originally ordered a pint of Wherry, the only ale available, but when poured it was completely vinegary and undrinkable (not the first time that’s happened to me there). As the only other choice was a smoothflow-type bitter, we were offered a bottle of St. Peters each which was fine. They were the only bottled ales in the pub though!

The verdict: I quite like The Oak. The owners and staff are great and the surroundings are really nice. It’s a very pleasant place to go. However, I always leave thinking I’d really like it a lot more if they paid more attention to their beer. I think they are in a bit of a ‘Catch22′ situation as they don’t have the turnover to justify more ales – let’s face it, if the very popular Wherry doesn’t sell fast enough and goes off they’re not selling lots. I have suggested ordering smaller quantities of local brewers’ ales in the past, but maybe that didn’t prove possible. Last night I suggested that they could try ofering a wider choice of bottled beers – maybe with a local flavour or conversely a range of good Belgian beers. They need to attract more custom and a Unique Selling Point like that would provide a good reason to go there. We’ll see – I’ll no doubt be going there again soon!

If you’re the slightest bit interested in how I while away my workdays here in the plush corporate world of Wensum Towers (down that little alleyway in Norwich Street) you can now find out.

I’m experimenting with a new service for my clients where I ‘Tweet’ each job I undertake on their websites. Where appropriate I mention their business and add a link to their site. Twitter is a good way to network for business and hopefully it should be of benefit to Wensum.net and my clients too.

Take a look at Wensum.net to get a flavour of my working day (the latest Tweets are displayed in the right hand column). If you have a Twitter account, please feel free to follow – look for the account name ‘Wensumdotnet‘.

Here’s an informative piece in the Fakenham Times showing the number of shoplifting offences in the town. They even provide a PDF document showing a breakdown of the crimes over the last 5 years, courtesy of the SNT (Safer Neighbourhood Team).

Apparently, since 2005 shoplifting cases in Fakenham have risen from 16 during that year to 32 in 2009. As a comparison, in Dereham the 2005 figure was 78 and now stands at 133 (a slight fall from 2008). The supermarkets are the hardest hit, it seems.

The SNT reports that 72% of these crimes in our town result in charges or some kind of action against the culprit.

One interesting point I realised… I spoke to a shopkeeper in Fakenham last year who was fed up to the back teeth with kids pinching stuff from their shop.  They said they were thinking of closing, with this being a contributary factor (I remember that was moaned at for recounting the conversation on the Kick Start Facebook group at the time). The shop did close and now has a new owner.  Strangely, it doesn’t even appear in the list the SNT published.

The new shop in Norwich Street now has a sign above the door. It’s called ‘Secrets’. Thought you might want to know that!

In other news, the Fakenham chapter of BNI (makes them sound like the Hells Angels) are seeking a local florist to join their ranks. Their contact details are here.

You know how big TV celebrities like Jonathan Ross and Stephen Fry get followed on Twitter by hundreds of fans. Well the reverse kind of situation just happened to me!

I run the IT side of a new company called House Advertiser, as you may have seen before on this blog. Part of our marketing strategy is to promote our services on our company blog, which is linked to Facebook and Twitter.

Just now, I recieved notification that our company Tweets are being followed by none other then Sarah Beeny, of Channel 4′s Property Ladder.

Hehe. Funny old world, innit?