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Is the High Street doomed

Understand that the scheme above, replaces a site that held around fifty small/local shops/businesses and a large supermarket. The supermarket may have failed but the shops were still going - I've only seen four, maybe five able to relocate to other places in the central area.

One of the first schemes involved funding to improve the part of the building with the smaller operators and redevelop the supermarket for other uses - It was rejected in favour of a much smaller area business development topped by lots of flats and even (gasp) penthouses! Thankfully that scheme expired.
 
Nightlife has been switching for a decade or more. Drinking culture, nightclub culture, it's all on the move, and landlords of boozers spotted this a while back, they're the best people to ask about the way of things.
 
stavros said:
I seem to recall reading somewhere, Private Eye or the Guardian I think, that those sweet shops were largely some kind of money laundering scam. I don't remember the details though.
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I've heard that from a few people. Pop-up manicure salons used to be a front for prostitution and people trafficking, so why not.
 
NoXion said:
Even if they weren't down on their luck, it's a business transaction at the end of the day. The only reason I wouldn't ask is because I know it's pointless to ask staff for discounts they have no power to give.
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As the business is going down the shitter they may offer a special price "off the books".

I remember when a US electronics chain withdrew from the UK market by closing their one flagship shop in Thurrock near lakeside they brought in some serious security to prevent such occurrences.
 
Cloo said:
Funnily enough, three long-term empty shopfronts on our local crappy high are suddenly being fitted out (one former bank in modern building, one double-fronted former convenience store and one small former hearing aid shop). Most likely uses - offices, laser beauty clinic type space and maybe a bookies but I think we have finally maxed out of the number this stretch can have.

On clubs, gsv and I still have one weekend with our kids away on camp so fancy some clubbing, but we're so out of circulation it's hard to know where to start - there are more clubs in London still than I thought there might be, but one issue is I can't tell necessarily which might be 'a bar with a DJ' and which might be ones where people actually dance, which is what we want.

I don't know about being drunkenly on the pull, but a life of social media certainly lowers the appeal of being permanently recorded as having been off your tits every weekend for the younger generation.
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Get yourself down Corsica Studios
 
BusLanes said:
Even the ones in the shopping centre?
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Why not? There were several manicure places in Whiteleys on Queensway. I went in a few times and, although at the time I didn't think much about it, there were a few dodgy things happening.

Some manicurists spoke no English, and would just point, and I remember one bloke in charge seemed like a mini Hitler, bossing them around. The manicurists were in and out of the salon all the time, and there was a lot of open prostitution in the area.

A lot of shopping centres are run down dumps, full of short lets.
 
The popular criteria for judging whether a business is a front for money laundering seem to be

1. I don't use the business

2. It is run by brown people

3. It's not very busy OR

4. It's too busy

I would add the perspective that for some families, setting up their failson (who can't hold down a job ) in a eg chicken shop or phone and vape shop is better than social disgrace. He can hang out there with his mates and play at running a business. I would say this accounts for at least some of the failing shops that you see.
 
Doesn't sound terribly hopeful if the industry rags are anything to go by - the piece below notes that only 10% of its stores were actually profitable and it's got severe problems in underlying strategy which aren't an easy fix, much of which is the stuff which made it liked by consumers in the first place. Central (expensive) locations and a big (complex & risky) range of cheap (low margin, high competition) non-food goods.

www.thegrocer.co.uk

How ‘loved’ high street discount retailer Wilko came to trouble

Wilko is in a struggle for survival, having last week filed a notice of intention to appointment administrators
www.thegrocer.co.uk www.thegrocer.co.uk
 
Rob Ray said:
Doesn't sound terribly hopeful if the industry rags are anything to go by - the piece below notes that only 10% of its stores were actually profitable and it's got severe problems in underlying strategy which aren't an easy fix, much of which is the stuff which made it liked by consumers in the first place. Central (expensive) locations and a big (complex & risky) range of cheap (low margin, high competition) non-food goods.
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If they don't survive, makes you wonder who is going to take up these central expensive locations... I imagine a load of them will stay empty.

It's one of the few shops in my local shopping centre I made use of.
 
Rob Ray said:
Doesn't sound terribly hopeful if the industry rags are anything to go by - the piece below notes that only 10% of its stores were actually profitable and it's got severe problems in underlying strategy which aren't an easy fix, much of which is the stuff which made it liked by consumers in the first place. Central (expensive) locations and a big (complex & risky) range of cheap (low margin, high competition) non-food goods.

www.thegrocer.co.uk

How ‘loved’ high street discount retailer Wilko came to trouble

Wilko is in a struggle for survival, having last week filed a notice of intention to appointment administrators
www.thegrocer.co.uk www.thegrocer.co.uk
Click to expand...

I am fairly sure the BiB is probably partly/mainly down to their debt mountain/pension fund underpayments, and having to factor in the cost of servicing that into the operating costs per store.

In a pre-packaged rescue deal, most/all the debt can be written off, like it was when McColls went bust and Morrisons took them over, with very few store closures, and thus saving most of the jobs.

Or, when Johnson Press, who I used to work for, went bust, reappearing as JPI Media, the 'I' being for 'International', none of their papers were closed at the time, and some job loses only came later on as they restructured.

So, fingers crossed.

Paywall busted link to that article - https://archive.ph/wwpvY
 
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hash tag said:
Could be, but depends on how the Franchise works. The franchise holders (?) could own the shops and let them to the franchisees?
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I doubt that, it's not how franchise businesses are operated, premises are normally down to franchisees to find, lease and operate.
 
ska invita said:
not a bad series this...quite sensitively done rather than misery porn...sort of
some pretty shocking high streets tbh

ep1 - Halifax

ep2 - Barrow in Furness

ep3 - Stoke - shocking to me
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Just watched the one on Stoke where he's walking round Hanley, the city's main shopping area. I used to know the place quite well in the early 80s. There was a nice radical bookshop (I think it was called Mushroom Books) where I was mates with one of the women who ran it. There was also a decent gay club there and a gay pub (can't remember the name of either). The city centre was pretty busy, though back then, the were loads of terraced streets in Hanley, all boarded up and waiting for demolition. This didn't bode well for the area.

He's into finding pot kilns. They were always good to see. Though when I worked in the potteries as a bander (Grindley's/Federated Potteries in Tunstall) they were no longer used. No surprise really as Stoke-on-Trent was possibly one of the most polluted places in the country. Still nice to see the odd surviving one.

I like the fella's attitude. He's positive and upbeat with none of that poverty and misery porn shite. Sad to see it in decline all the same.

The thing I always liked best about the city though was the people. By and large, I found most Stokies I lived and worked with to be really friendly and welcoming.
 
ska invita said:
not a bad series this...quite sensitively done rather than misery porn...sort of
some pretty shocking high streets tbh

ep1 - Halifax

ep2 - Barrow in Furness

ep3 - Stoke - shocking to me
Click to expand...

Fuck. I watched the Stoke one. That’s unreal. I wonder what scam is going on with ‘Etruscan Square’. I like the presenter, and I really appreciated his refusal to film addicts in despair.
 
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