A Raynes Park bakery slated on TV has hit back at the programme makers - and its staff said business was booming the day after the broadcast.

This week Maher and Sons was the subject of a scathing BBC documentary starring retail guru Mary Portas - the first in a new series of Mary Queen of Shops which sees the presenter attempt to transform struggling businesses.

But one employee said the film had been selectively edited - and added the shop was busier than ever the day after Monday’s programme was broadcast.

On Tuesday Catriona Maher said: “It’s been very busy today and people have been very positive.”

She added: “Mary did have ideas but it was the way she presented them. She did things behind our backs and set things up for TV.”

The retail guru clashed with shop owner Angela Maher, who was unimpressed with Ms Portas’s suggestion to re-model the store as an ‘artisan bakery’. The show’s dramatic conclusion saw her order Ms Portas and her film crew out of the shop.

Catriona Maher, Angela’s daughter-in-law, said they had been expecting more support and advice from the BBC. She also said the Durham Road shop sold a wider range of products and was more frequently refurbished than the show had implied.

The building has been a bakery since 1883, and the Mahers have owned it for 37 years. About 15 years ago it won a Merton retail excellency award - a community business prize backed by the publishers of the Wimbledon Guardian.

Angela Maher was criticised by viewers online after this week’s programme, with one labelling her “unpardonably rude”.

But frequent customer Holly Ellis said: “Anyone who has spent time at the Maher bakery will tell you its greatest attribute is its genuine commitment to the community. I’m sure this programme will have been edited so as not to draw attention to this.”