It was December 1977, and these early-morning shoppers were queuing for bread at Greggs in the Greenmarket, Newcastle.
Forty-five years ago, the famous bakery brand was well on its way to becoming a Tyneside institution. Today it's a nationwide phenomenon. In 2022 there were more than 2,200 Greggs stores around the UK, with 21 alone in Newcastle, while the city with the most outlets was Glasgow with 35.
Originally known as Greggs of Gosforth, the company was founded by John Gregg and baked its first stottie cakes on the eve of World War II in 1939. The first shop opened in 1951 in Gosforth and since then the company has gone from strength to strength. Starting from its Geordie base, Greggs has expanded nationally since the 1970s by adding other regional bakery chains to its roster.
READ MORE: Back to school on Tyneside in the 1970s: 10 photographs from across the decade
After acquiring bread-making firms from Glasgow to Manchester, and Yorkshire to Kent, Greggs became market leader when it bought up its main rival Bakers Oven in 2008.
While Greggs has been part and parcel of city life for decades, there was a Greenmarket in Newcastle for around 400 years. The 1977 version of the market in our photograph sat in Eldon Square shopping centre at Clayton Street. It had opened a year earlier.
It closed in January 2007 and was pulled down later that year to make way for a revamp of Eldon Square. Traders were originally told a new Greenmarket would be created in the revamped shopping centre, but in July 2008 the council decided it would be too costly. They moved into units at the centre’s High Friars on a temporary basis, but this arrangement came to an end in 2011.
In October this year, ChronicleLive reported how Greggs had opened 106 new shops so far in 2022 and was eyeing up 150 net shop openings over the full year, having closed 16 sites. Meanwhile, away from its ever-popular sandwiches and bakery goods, Greggs' latest special seasonal menu includes items such as the festive bake, vegan festive bake, Christmas lunch soup, vegan turkey-free and stuffing festive baguette, and mint mocha, mint hot chocolate and salted caramel latte.
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