Honesty Reigns on Boxing Day

As always, we try to bring you the best and latest in honor-payment commerce schemes. Here’s one from a town called Settle in North Yorkshire, England:

A shopkeeper in North Yorkshire who wanted a day off on Boxing Day decided to leave his store open and let his customers help themselves.
Tom Algie, who runs the Practically Everything hardware store in Settle, returned to work at the end of the day to find an honesty box full of money.
“It was stuffed with notes and coins,” said Mr Algie. “There was £187 in it and two euros, which is pretty good.”
Grateful shoppers had also left notes thanking him for trusting them.

That’s from a BBC article; here’s another take, with better pictures, from the Daily Mail.
There used to be some very robust comments at the Daily Mail article, but they seem to have been erased. My guess is that the comments descended into name-calling, since an early round of comments that I read implied that such honesty could only happen in a small town where certain types of people — you know who they are, wink wink — don’t come around.
Here’s another bit from the Daily Mail piece:

[The owner’s] note read: “Yes, I have given everyone the day off, including me, so please choose the items you want and place the right money inside, Merry Christmas.”
Customers also left notes saying what goods they had bought, and this, combined with a quick check of his stock, confirmed that Mr. Algie’s trust was not abused.
Instead of being behind the counter, the divorcee had spent the day with his son Joe, 23, and daughter Beth, 18.

I wonder how well Mr. Algie would do if he trusted his customers on a regular basis. One of the things that kept the Bagel Man’s customers honest was the threat that he would pull their precious supply of bagels and donuts if they slipped below an acceptable rate. Are the goods in a hardware store as precious?
(Hat tip: Marcus Fardoe and Rachael Churchill)