Some of us will have fond memories of one appropriately named shop in Oxford’s Covered Market.

There are no prizes for guessing what Cyril Nicholson and his staff offered customers at The Sweet Shop.

Now the family tradition is continuing with Cyril’s grand-daughter Ali Tripkovic and her daughter Jemma Graham starting their own business in Kidlington.

What’s more, they have revived the family’s original name - it’s called Stanley’s Sweets & Treats.

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Ali’s great grandfather, Arthur Stanley, owned a butchers in Worksop, Nottinghamshire, and started the family’s link with the retail trade.

His son-in-law, Cyril Nicholson, settled in Oxfordshire with his wife Winifred, Arthur’s daughter, running the post office in Eden Drive, Headington, then the Corner Shop in New High Street before opening The Sweet Shop in the Covered Market.

You can see Cyril in his white uniform serving young customers outside his market shop on Christmas Eve 1961 in the picture below.

(Image: Oxford Mail) Now Ali and Jemma, the fourth and fifth generation of the Stanleys, are continuing the family tradition with great success in the Kidlington Centre.

As the latest name suggests, you can get more than just sweets at Stanley’s Sweets & Treats - customers can sit down and enjoy tea, coffee, cakes, ice cream and much more.

Ali and Jemma had always thought of opening a shop and their chance came when premises off Kidlington High Street came on the market.

Ali recalls: “Both of us were looking for a change of direction and it was too good a chance to miss. We bought the business in 2021 and changed the name to Stanley’s to honour the family history.”

The shop not only serves a variety of food and drink but has become a community hub for people, particularly those living alone, to meet and chat. It also displays posters from many village groups on its walls.

When the shop next door became vacant, Ali and Jemma, who both live in Kidlington, took the opportunity to expand and now have doubled the amount of space they started with.

That is not the end of their plans - they are due to open a kitchen and serve hot snacks and savouries and become a fully-fledged tearoom.

The family’s connection with Oxford Covered Market reminds us that it has been a special year for the market - it is celebrating its 250th anniversary, having opened in 1774.

One business we have featured is Brown’s Cafe, which is marking 104 years in business.

As we recalled (Memory Lane, July 8), scenes for the TV detective series Morse and Endeavour were shot inside and outside the premises.

The cafe was opened in 1920 by Catherine Brown, daughter of Charles Brown, mayor of Oxford in 1932-33.

She died in 1977, aged 91, having achieved her goal of providing “plain food, well cooked and plenty of it”. She often said: “I have no customers, only friends.”

Current owner Humberto Freitas took over the lease in 2010 having helped his parents, Agostinho and Maria, run the cafe since his schooldays. His sister Catarina is also involved in the business.

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About the author 

Andy is the Trade and Tourism reporter for the Oxford Mail and you can sign up to his newsletters for free here. 

He joined the team more than 20 years ago and he covers community news across Oxfordshire.

His Trade and Tourism newsletter is released every Saturday morning. 

You can also read his weekly Traffic and Transport newsletter.