A TALLER-THAN-AVERAGE man made a longer-than-average journey to Thornbury to update his wardrobe.

Jean-Paul Siebor, from Cateau Cambresis, 110 miles from Calais, made the 700 mile, 14 hour round trip especially to visit Thornbury big and tall men's clothing retailer Big Tall Order last week.

The 6ft 8ins Frenchman had bought clothes online through the firm before but decided to make the trip in person before buying £500 in clothes.

It’s not the first time the company has welcomed an overseas customer to its store, with one customer flying from Norway to buy new clothes.

Nick Cooper, owner of Big Tall Order, said that whilst customers will frequently travel long distances within the UK to visit, this was the first time anyone had driven from Europe specifically to visit the company.

“Recently we had a man drive from Bexhill-on-Sea in Sussex to visit us but it’s not very often people travel from another country to visit us,” he said.

“We have noticed a trend with people travelling increasingly longer distances to visit us but it’s pretty special that we’ve now had a man from France visit us."

Jean-Paul made the trip on one tank of diesel to have the opportunity to try on some of the clothing in person before buying it.

Mr Cooper added: “He thought he may as well come over and visit us in person to buy the clothes rather than buy them online and have to worry about returning anything if it doesn’t fit.

“He was happy to come over and visit us and we were glad to have him in Thornbury.”

Mr Siebor left his home at 3am on Friday morning (June 19) and arrived in the town shortly after midday.

He stayed in Thornbury with Nick until 4pm before heading home, having to catch a later-than-planned ferry, arriving back home at 1am on Saturday morning.

Big Tall Order sell a range of clothing for the bigger or taller man and also sell footwear up to size 17 via their website www.bigtallorder.co.uk.