Dawlish postmaster marks 50 years milestone in his role at Exeter road

Roger Honey has reached his 50 years’ milestone as Postmaster for Exeter Road Post Office in Dawlish.

However, Roger has actually run his branch since October 1962 when his family took on the Post Office and shop – an impressive 62 years.

His Mum, Eileen had previously run a drapers’ and shoe shop in Winkleigh, before they decided to move to the coast. They took on Exeter Road Post Office and grocery shop.

Roger remembers how he was 18 years old when they moved to Dawlish. From the outset he started running the Post Office and his Mum mainly focussed on the shop.

The long-serving postmaster commented: “I was a novelty at first, having a young person running the Post Office!

“My Mum was officially the postmaster until I took on the title in January 1975, but I had been doing that role from the start, so I have now been running Exeter Road Post Office for 62 years.

“I have always enjoyed serving people – I love the contact with customers. I have never been unhappy in the job. I really like being part of my community.

“The area has changed a lot in the last 60 plus years, it has grown enormously with lots more homes in the area and the holiday homes and caravan parks in the area have expanded too, so in the summer it’s a lot busier.

“There are no banks in the area anymore – so we have become a place for people to do their personal and business banking.”

Roger is very grateful to a long-serving member of staff, Jamie Davey, who has worked with him for 26 years. With the help of Jamie and his other “brilliant” staff they managed to keep the branch open throughout the pandemic to maintain vital services to the community. It was a very busy time as more people were working from home and with social distancing people were queued along the street.

That was when home shopping really took off for home shopping returns and people now use his branch to collect their parcels from as he can safely store them when people can’t be home to accept deliveries.

Exeter Road also now offers Evri and DPD services drop off and collections in addition to the traditional Royal Mail and Parcelforce services and Roger said that his customers really like having extra choice.

Post Office Area Manager, Nicola Ballard, said: “Roger is a first-class postmaster who really cares about the community that he serves. It’s very impressive that Roger has been the postmaster for half-a-century. In fact he has been at the heart of this Dawlish community for 62 years as he’s actually run this branch all his adult life.

“Roger runs a great post office adapting with the times to meet the changing needs of his community. I want to sincerely thank Roger for his amazing commitment to the people of Dawlish.”

A 50 Years’ Postmaster Long Service award has been presented to Roger to thank him for his long and loyal service to the community as Postmaster.