Cornish residents bummed out after B&Q sells toilet named after their town
The rivalry between Cornish towns and villages can be quite pronounced, with those on each side of the Camel Trail insisting that theirs is the best.
But has friendly competitive turned foul?
Some are now wondering exactly why one major town in the county has now been ‘honoured’ by having a toilet named after it.
You can now hop onto the B&Q website to buy a ‘Bodmin Close-coupled Toilet with Standard close seat’.
Residents may not be too flattered by their town becoming the namesake for the bog-standard piece of plumbing.
And they may find the comparison even more smelly when they realise that at £75, it is one of the cheapest on sale and not one of the highest quality en suite experiences.
It can be bought alongside a Bodmin Full pedestal Basin for just £130 in total – which is quite a good deal, to be fair.
Bodmin, which has a population of around 16,500 people, is the seventh biggest town or city in Cornwall and is historically important – as a former county town, it was the only Cornish settlement to be entered in the Domesday Book.
However, parts of the town are far from the postcard tourist idyll of Cornwall, with the town centre listed among the top 10% most deprived areas in England.
B&Q state that ‘this open back close-coupled toilet from Plumbsure’s Bodmin range comes with a standard close lid and white seat. It also includes dual flush.’
They add that ‘the eco-friendly 4L/6L dual flush saves on water and money’.
Those who have reviewed it are not quite certain of its quality, giving it 3.8 stars on average.
Some were quite unhappy, with one saying: ‘Toilet is pretty average, but the flush seal doesn’t seal meaning water flows constantly into the bowl and the cistern refills every 20 seconds. Also there are no fixings to fit cistern to the wall. Toilet seat is rubbish also.’
By comparison, reviewers of the actual town of Bodmin were more generous, with the museum scoring 4.5 stars on Tripadviser and the nearby Roughtor and Brown Willy circular walk getting 4.
B&Q has not only singled out Bodmin among Cornish destinations, as a slightly more expensive toilet has also been named ‘Falmouth’, currently on sale from £95 down to £71.
A Cooke & Lewis toilet also sold by the store and on clearance is called Helston, while the Cornish capital of Truro lends its name to another loo on clearance for £45.
But it is the Bodmin model, still at full price, that has generated most interest, with one shopper commenting online that it is ‘taking the piss out of Bodmin…’
Another asked why more low-hanging fruit was not used for naming purposes, given that there are towns in Cornwall called ‘Flushing’ and ‘Looe’.
B&Q have been contacted for comment.
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