It may feel like a completely unheard of concept for younger generations, but many will remember the local Cockle Man doing the rounds at our Liverpool pubs decades ago.
Before sit down meals and more of a variety of food and drink on offer, the Cockle Man would come calling in his white jacket carrying a basket of seafood for punters to buy and enjoy with their pints. Sometimes doused in vinegar, customers could also enjoy shrimps, whelks, kippers and more, often bringing them home in grease proof bags for the family to try.
Today, the job isn't as common and very much considered a thing of the past, but for years, Cockle Men were a massive part of pub and nightlife culture in our city. As part of the Liverpool ECHO's How It Used To Be series, we spoke to one former Cockle Man about working in the business 50 years ago.
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Mike Penn, 77, now lives in Maghull and started working as a Cockle Man in 1968 to save up for a deposit on a house with his wife Vivienne. Working Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays up until 1972, Mike left the role when he got a new full-time job.
Mike told the ECHO: "When my wife Vivienne and I got engaged we decided we’d save up for a house. We both got jobs in pubs and I worked in The Black Horse pub in Old Swan. I was working five or six nights there and my wife was working about four nights in a pub in Norris Green by the Broadway.
"We were hardly seeing each other as we were both working during the day and working at night. This fella was coming into The Black Horse selling cockles and mussels so I used to chat to him and found out more about his job.
"He was earning more in the three nights doing that than I was earning in the five or six nights working behind the bar. I thought have I got the bottle to do it because it takes some nerve to walk into a crowded pub with a big basket of fish and shouting out does anyone want any cockles or mussels. I thought I can do that and that's how it happened."
In the late sixties and early seventies, Mike worked for a company called Seacove Shell Fisheries, based in Park Road, Toxteth. The business employed men and women who had set areas to go out every night and sell cockles, mussels and more to customers at different pubs.
Mike said: "I was living in West Derby when I first started with my mum and dad so I used to go to the depot in Park Road and they used to give you the cockles, mussels, shrimps, prawns, whelks and kippers. You used to have a big basket and they used to give you many of each that were in little cartons.
"They provided us with a little white jacket and I used to start about 7.30pm or 8pm at night. I only worked for two hours selling and travelling between pubs and running the car."
Mike's patch tended to be Dingle, Garston, Allerton and Mossley Hill and sometimes he would go to other pubs when their regular Cockle Man was off. Mike said the most popular product with his customers were cockles and shrimps, but that he sold fewer whelks and usually had regular orders for kippers.
He said: "I'd put an order in for different cartons because I knew my rounds. We didn't have crab sticks then, I know they went on to have them but when I was working they hadn't been invented.
"I would order a few extra just in case and you had to provide your own salt, pepper and vinegar and we used to buy little plastic forks from Seacove and pass them around. Some pubs used to let you in and I always used to ask.
"Some pubs would say no and would say you’re impinging on our sales of crisps and nuts. All those years ago those pubs didn't sell food, it was crisps, nuts, pickled onions, little bits of cheese."
At the time, Mike said the job was save and return, meaning there was no flat fee and the more you sold the more you made and that he remembers customers getting used to decimal coins when they came in in 1971. Mike said he didn't really experience any trouble from punters and that Vivienne would often come on the rounds with him, at first waiting in the car and later making friends with customers which meant Mike could pick her up at last orders.
Mike said: "As the night wore on it got more and more lively. There were a lot of smaller pubs, not like the bigger ones like there are now and there was a good atmosphere in them.
"You would go in to find someone at the piano or singing. Some would take the mickey out of you a bit and every time someone would say ‘ay mate have you got any crabs’ I would say 'I've never heard that before' - I'd heard it about 50 times. You had to be outgoing, you couldn't shrink, you had to have the confidence to walk into a crowded pub with people around you and shouting."
Mike said regular customers would look forward to the arrival of a Cockle Man every week and that in the end, he started to give people notice in advance if he wasn't on shift so they would know not to expect any goods. He said: "The nice thing about it was it gave you personal confidence to do it - meeting people all the time, chatting to them, having banter, talking about football, anything.
"You couldn't hover around as much as you liked sometimes because time was money, you had to move on to the next pub. But I always tried to give people time to chat."
Do you remember Cockle Men visiting Merseyside pubs? Let us know in the comments section below.
Whilst it was a commitment to give up Friday and Saturday nights from a social aspect, Mike was still able to enjoy his weekends and mix with people. He said: " One of the advantages for me was while I was saving up for my house, I felt like I was going out because I was mixing with people who were enjoying themselves and wasn't spending anything apart from petrol. I was earning money and coming back with more money than I went out with."
The main purpose of the job for Mike was to save up and put a deposit down on a house - and the hard work paid off. He said: "We got married in 1970 and we bought the house in 1970.
"We lived in Turnbridge Road in Maghull and it was £3,250 we paid for it and that was an awful lot of money. We had to put £300 or £400 down and had all the solicitors fees."
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Mike said the job was "hard work and commitment" and that a lot has changed through the generations since the days he worked as a Cockle Man. He said: "Society has changed so much now.
"The way pubs are run are so different now. They're more family orientated, it was rare for women to go to the pub on their own and the clubs were just starting in Liverpool, the likes of the cavern club would finish at midnight to get the last bus home.
"You didn't get taxis anywhere, you didn't have the money to get a taxi, you stayed local in your area. People would come home with their pay package on a Friday and then go out.
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"Friday night was men's night and Saturday night was bring your wife or partner out, it's not like that now. Everybody dealt with cash, there were no cards, nothing like that.
"Kids weren't allowed in pubs then and the timings were different. Last orders were 10.30pm, so I don't know how it would work today if you were to sell cockles.
"The context of the job is different to the social life you have in pubs - it was totally different 50 years ago to what they are now. I don’t think it would be the same doing it now.
"I don't think the pubs would let you as they all sell food or there’s kids running around. I couldn't imagine me going to Wetherspoons and selling cockles and mussels now."
Through the generations, it wasn't uncommon to spot local cocklers working the beach. One image shows men busy collecting cockles on an early morning in 1973, whereas another shows West Kirby Cockling in 1992.
For many, it's been years since they last saw their local cockle man. But it's not a completely lost trade.
Nottingham Live previously reported how no night out in Nottingham was complete without a pot of prawns or cockles from Dave Bartram, aka the Cockle Man. Dave and a basket of seafood have been doing the rounds for nearly 60 years and last year, he also became popular on TikTok.
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