Handcrafted Artisanal Everything

To Gloucester services, then. A place about which I am ambivalent.

If you're unfamiliar with Gloucester, or it's sister services the (to my mind marginally superior) Cumbrian Tebay, it's somewhat different from your standard motorway services.

You know the ones, a KFC, a WH Smiths, two of those massage chairs and, mystifyingly, a shop selling phone cases. Where hope goes to die and an acrid coffee will set you back a fiver. Where, if you're lucky, there'll be an M&S so you can at least get something that resembles food, even if you have to remortgage to do so.

Gloucester is different to these. A food hall and farm shop in a rather lovely building, all wood, glass, stone and clean lines, it's pleasing to the eye and a significantly more pleasant experience than, say Lymm, at least aesthetically.

It's also possibly the most middle-class place on the planet, lots of mums with sunglasses pushed up over their hair (which is inevitably in a ponytail) and dad's dressed as if they're off for a spot of bouldering followed by a "cheeky couple of craft brewskis". Herein lies the tension for me.

I eat at Gloucester a fair amount, we bob up and down to the South West on a semi-regular amount and it marks almost precisely the halfway point of the journey. The food is okay, not quite as good as it thinks it is, but definitely an improvement on a Burger King at Sandbach. It at least is making an effort, there's lots of chat about locality and sustainability, all of which is only to be applauded, and a bit of thought's gone into it, which is always good to see. I'd be yelling at any chef of mine that sent it out, but for a services it's acceptable.

The "farm shop" (bearing as much resemblance to the original meaning of the term as your average garden centre does to its) is, of course, nothing of the sort, and is deeply ridiculous. Profoundly so. Ludicrous in a way that's usually the preserve of a Sunday newspaper lifestyle supplement earnestly explaining why you need to drop a hundred nicker on a trowel.

As I explained it to my disbelieving sons, it's largely an exercise in separating the overpaid from a decent slice of their wage. It's mostly selling aspiration, a lifestyle, and handmade chocolates at a fiver a pop. Though, it must be said, middle son has a ritual of always getting a posh scotch egg, and one of my commis chefs is deeply upset if I come back without a sausage roll. It's good gear, but I'm not 100% certain it's as good as the price tag justifies.

And here is where I get uneasy. This is dangerous territory. Gloucester represents the gentrification of motorway services, and that has cons as well as pros. Undoubtedly it's nicer, for me, at any rate. I'm all in favour of people raising standards and providing a wider choice. But I also detect amidst the artfully stacked tins of artisan sweets the widening gulf at the heart of British society. Because sometimes it feels as though for some people, simply being more expensive is better. Slapping the words "Handcrafted" and "Artisanal" on some minced pig and pastry is enough. It feels distinctly like gatekeeping.

(I'm going to undermine my own argument here and bang the drum for their butchers though, it's tremendous. I don't mind things being expensive if they're worth it, and this is good stuff, anyway, back to the lefty polemic)

We are becoming a society of haves and have lots, and while it may have always been thus, the gap is widening. We are the 9th most unequal society of the 38 OECD developed economies, the bottom 20% have only 8% of the income and a paltry 0.5% of the wealth. The gap narrowed steadily from the peak of the 1930s to 1979, but since then has grown. I shall leave it to the reader to deduce the reasons for this.

Okay, I am being somewhat unfair to what is, when all's said and done, a place to grab a packet of sweets and maybe a pint of milk in case the shop's shut when you get to the holiday rental. I am also laying myself open to accusations of ruining local communities by using a holiday rental. Slippery slope innit. 

I am firmly on the Gloucester services using side, but I have spent many years in the "are you mad, no way we can afford that" camp, and am acutely aware that we're just a recession or two from being there again. I'm probably slap bang in the middle of the "aspirational middle class" demographic, so you'd think a platter if Cumvmbrian charcuterie for twenty quid would be just my bag, and you'd be right. It's lovely. But it isn't for everyone, and at Gloucester I see that writ large.