A new season for Salago…
…& its owner Jim Pilkington
After over 54 years in Totnes under the care of its family owners Christiane and then her husband Jim Pilkington, the business Salago is now up for sale, with the shop set to close at the end of February 2026. Jim Pilkington, the shop’s current nonagenarian manager/owner, is hanging up his Salago kaftan to spend more time in his lamé (clothing from the sport of fencing!). This feels like a historic moment for Totnes.
A little bit of magic
Those of us who have been around a while (or went away and returned, like myself!) can walk into Salago and in an instant the smell of the wool, incense and natural fibres give us an olfactory hit that take us back to memories of Totnes many moons ago. It can evoke a little bit of magic for those of us who remember Salago as the original ‘hippy shop’ of Totnes. Going into Salago then felt a little like stepping into a magical world with Mr Ben (from the popular 70’s Children’s TV programme!) and it still has that charm and a comfy and community vibe.
Jim, who turned a sprightly 90 in August, is stopping work and wants to pass the business on to someone else – ideally the person / people would be Steiner orientated in their beliefs / thinking.
If they don’t manage to sell the business on, then he will try continuing the website sales. Interested parties would acquire the tenancy and Jim is happy to sell the business for more or less the cost of the current stock held. An amazing deal for a business with a 54 year legacy and which so many people associate with Totnes. Jim has had a lot of concerned customers very sad to think of Totnes without a Salago (some in tears), so it is many people’s hope that someone can take this soulful business on and continue its success.
Salago has links with many countries and 20% of the stock comes from Nepal, with 10% of the sales going to an orphanage in Kathmandu for the last eleven years. The shop has previously had links with Bali, with its own brand of Balinese clothing at one point (Ibu Indah). Salago also has links with suppliers in India and of course European suppliers where a lot of the toys and slippers are from.
Salago was started in 1971 by Jim’s wife Christiane (known locally as Tissi). Tissi started the shop with her friend Ron and the shop was originally at 26 High street, Totnes (now the restaurant Circa) and originally was just women’s alternative / ethnic fashion. When speaking to locals at the time she was met with the statement, “An alternative shop in Totnes? That will never catch on.” A trailblazer, she created the first alternative shop in Totnes. It may be hard to imagine now with ‘alternative’ being Totnes’s normal, though Salago was quite out of place at that time among the more common conservative tweeds and twin sets of country style fashion shops.
Sweet little mystery
In its origins Salago even had (and still has) its own tagline “Salago – the shop that is a little different”. When I asked Jim about its name, me presuming it may be the name of some Hindu deity or have an ancient Sanskrit meaning, he enlightened me: “The name Salago was Tissi’s inspiration. Very few know its real make up which was even kept a secret from their children for many years!” If you want to know, you’ll have to come and treat yourself – the answer is hidden somewhere in the shop in small writing.
Tissi from Karlsruhe in Germany, had not long met Jim after coming to Totnes. They met in a fencing class at Foxhole as they had both liked the idea of fencing and sweetly also had the hope that they ‘might meet someone’ romantically. Jim was very impressed when he saw this “gorgeous lady come in to fence” and they married a year after Salago started and expanded their family shortly afterwards. Juggling the business with a young family was always a challenge and after some years Jim started to get involved in the business too.
Two more branches followed in Exeter opposite what was then the Odeon Cinema in Sidwell Street and also one Newton Abbot with a strong following in both, often with queues outside the shop in the morning, particularly on January Sale days.
It was a way of life for me
If their lives were not busy enough running several shops though, when their youngest child was born in 1977, they decided that they wished to send their children to a Steiner School. Tissi and
her family having been involved in Anthroposophy for many years and her sister sending her children to a Steiner Waldorf school in Germany, the seed was sown to start the local school. A metal detecting trip to Bantham Beach found the first £3.45 to open the account for the School and together with other interested parents, links and help from other established Steiner Schools, the first class started in 1981 with their older son and 5 other children. They remained heavily involved with the school for many years.
The Family Way
In 1983 the shop expanded and moved to 51 High street, under the Butterwalk, where the shop ‘Butterwalk’ and the 2nd Curator cafe now resides. At first they just had the downstairs and then in around 1984/5 they acquired the large upstairs to start their toy emporium. Anyone who remembers the shop, particularly from their childhood will remember what a vast Aladdin’s cave this top floor was, again engendering a sense of wonder with children running up the stairs and being tearful having to leave. Jim says that they “focused on toys and gifts that would be of appeal to parents of children at the local Steiner School” and that Tissi was horrified when Jim started selling plastic toys, though as Jim says, he was aware that not everyone could afford the wooden ones.
The two young boys were often seen selling dipped candles, daffodils and hand made Elizabethan quills, dressed in Elizabethan costumes on a stall outside the shop, giving half of the money raised to the Steiner School.
Stepping off the gas
In 2005, Tissi started to take more of a backseat role and eventually became a sleeping partner, moving out to Portugal. Jim running the day-to-day business, the three boys also taking small roles with two of their wives also working in the shop, it became truly a family run business.
Salago moved again in 2022 to its current location 56 High Street, close to the Narrows, in a move to downsize and sell 51 High Street with Jim already well into his 80’s and still full of enthusiasm.
Chatting to Jim over a nice Curator coffee in the former Salago store, Jim tells me that he was born in Cheshire where he spent most of his childhood. At the age of 15 he joined the Royal Navy as an apprentice, then becoming a cadet and then latterly an engineering Officer. Jim spent 9 years in the Navy, travelling to Scandinavia, the Med and the West Indies and he thoroughly enjoyed serving his country. He was forced to leave as he was experiencing blackouts and to his dismay was served notice from the Navy. Jim’s next vocation was as a ‘civvy’ engineer in London and Reading and he really hated what he called being among the ‘bowler hat and umbrella lot’! This led to a desire to leave the city and head for the country and Harbertonford in Devon was his choice, knowing the area from when he trained at Dartmouth in his Navy days.
Jim’s more like a friend than a boss
Jim emphasises that his whole life he lives to serve and not to take. He is a Christian and is very motivated to share Rudolf Steiner’s view of the world, which Jim has always been inspired by and to this day Salago has cards, books and toys that are Steiner orientated. “We have adopted the objective suggested by Rudolf Steiner that you are in business to serve other people, rather than the materialist’s one of to make piles of dosh. Our answer to the cynic of such a principle is, if you do it well enough, you may in fact end with a greater profit”.
Literally Literal
On retirement Jim is set to write a book called ‘The Challenges of Life and their Purpose’. Jim wants this book to convey the wisdom of the Steiner approach in everyday language. Jim espouses the Steiner view that there is a definite purpose as to why we are here and this is what he would like to write about. Another thing Jim has no intention of stopping when he retires from his Salago life is his other passion – fencing! Amazingly, Jim is still a keen fencer at 90 years of age and his eyes shine brightly when he talks about it. I learn that he was equal 3rd in the 1998 National Veterans
Championship which qualified him to represent GB in the World Championships and which he did on a further 6 occasions. “In 2005 I won the Over 70s Commonwealth Championship and was equal 3rd in European. My best result in a World Event was to be 11th when it was in Tampa in the USA. I am still competing at the age of 90 and did the European back in Bulgaria in 2025. It is a really fantastic sport – half physical and very much in your mind observing and misleading your opponent and this where great fun awaits!”
Jim currently coaches people at fencing classes twice a week, at Totnes and in Newton Abbot. He says that when he learnt fencing it was quite regimented and now he is happy to teach it in more a looser and fun way. He tells me with glee that he will be “ready to die” when he “can no longer fence”! And that fencing makes him feel “alive again” with “sheer excitement”.
It seems that ‘retirement’ will be a busy and exciting time for Jim, full of purpose. As he waits to see what the next part of the story for Salago may be, I asked Jim what he felt made Salago successful and he answers that being consistent in the image of the shop is key. He decided to capitalise on his own interests (Steiner education and wonderfully ethnic and ethical fashion) and also his motivation of being in business to serve others was key.
Salago Changing Hands?
Anyone wanting to buy the Salago business could also inherit a loyal team of 9 part-time staff members, who are really like the family of the shop and know the business so well. Jim tells me he has taken inspiration from the Japanese model of business which is to treat staff like family. Maureen Riley, who will have worked for Salago for 26 years at the end of the month tells me a bit about what it’s been like to work there “Jim’s more like a friend than a boss, it’s been a lovely shop to work in, it’s been the longest employment I’ve ever had, five years was my previous limit. I’ve made good friends with customers (and staff) over the years, people have been lovely “
As Maureen tells me this over the counter of the shop, we are gifted with a lovely pause to reflect, as a customer relays a beautiful and very personal story of what the shop Salago means to them. After that intimate moment, echoing Jim’s thoughts, Maureen says “it’s a way of life (for me) really- not just a job”
It seems that whatever happens to Salago next, this moment is the end ( and beginning!) of an era and the people of Totnes are grateful to Jim, Tissi, their family and all staff and customers of Salago past and present, for a beautiful and most colourful season.
The Fencing classes are at Totnes Leisure Centre on Tuesdays 7 – 9pm – everyone welcome!