Jeremy Clarkson's farm shop sparks traffic concerns as visitors flock to Chipping Norton

  • Watch the video report by Charlotte Briere-Edney. Pictures from Amazon/'Clarkson's Farm' and Loose Women/ITV


Queues snake round a field deep in the Oxfordshire countryside. From the number of visitors, you would be forgiven for thinking this is Stonehenge or another international tourist attraction. In fact, the two-and-a-half-hour wait is to enter a tiny farm shop owned by TV presenter Jeremy Clarkson.

The store comprises a small stone barn, with an attached sheltered area to eat snacks from the cafe.

Many journey for hours to get to the store the shop - sometimes planning whole holidays around their visit to Diddly Squat.

It's the celebrity pull of Clarkson himself - rather than the £12.50 honey - that's the appeal.

"We saw it on TV obviously and love Jeremy Clarkson so I thought we'd head over and have a look, took the dog with us," recount two young men from Peterborough. "Everything was as expected, very nice," they add, "it was quite pricey."

"We wouldn't have come if he hadn't put it on the map," explained some girls from Yorkshire who organised a trip to the Cotswolds in order to go to the store.

The shop is located inside a small converted stone barn

The Farm shop started as an offshoot of the recent hit series Clarkson's Farm - which shows the outspoken presenter and his partner getting to grips with the challenges of modern agriculture. 

The shop is now a tourist attraction in its own right - and its impact is being felt in the local community. A few minutes down the road in the small village of Chadlington, there are mixed views.

Local butcher Tom Dean told us: "A few people are welcoming to it, because it brings more new faces to the area and gets the Chadlington name out there. But there are also a few people that aren't as keen."

The Parish Council has expressed concerns about the "substantial" level of traffic and parking in a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The shop has also applied for planning application to make external changes to the current buildings.

Many locals are incredulous about the queues and popularity of the store, but some locals told us that after a tough year, the visitors are welcome.

Mr Clarkson has previously apologised on Twitter for traffic issues, and he told ITV Meridian things were too "frantic" for an interview.

With a new series of Clarkson's Farm already in the pipeline, the success of this little shop, and the queue outside it, don't appear to be going anywhere.