Is the High Street doomed
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cupid_stunt
Chief seagull hater & farmerbarleymow's nemesis.
It's a bit weird in Worthing too, empty shop units, yet the council is looking at developments to bring about more retail space, very odd. *shrugs*
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
A whole new shopping centre is being built here in Nottingham, with no explanation for where the public are supposed to get the money to buy enough stuff to justify the extra square footage of retail. The centre it's replacing is mostly small shops selling cheap crap because the city is too poor and too small to sustain two large shopping centres full of expensive stuff.
There are plenty of empty retail units around already and turnover of new businesses, especially restaurants, is high. So building a new, bigger centre will obviously solve this problem...somehow.
hash tag
Books, not bombs
Reminds me of Wandsworth. It has a small, tatty shopping centre which had a few independents in it, nothing special. They got pushed out, the centre tarted up and newer plusher chains moved in. Two or three have since closed down and there is also a Debs, for whom the future is uncertain.
not-bono-ever
meh
The idea that expanded retail presence invariably benefits the community is half baked to say the least, and that is before you dust off the Marxian immiseration take on things ( I am not even going to go there as it has been far too long ago for me to think about)
not-bono-ever
meh
branson has done well- I cannot remember the detail and cost of the NR bailout but somehow, somewhere in this , the taxpayer has gifting the bearded toothy prig millions
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
they've closed a number before, including the tottenham court road one.
skyscraper101
0891 50 50 50
I was well pissed when they closed the Tottenham Court Road one. That was my go to for post-work microwave Chicken Byriani 
Bahnhof Strasse
Met up with Hannah Courtoy a week next Tuesday
Bahnhof Strasse
Met up with Hannah Courtoy a week next Tuesday
I was well pissed when they closed the Tottenham Court Road one. That was my go to for post-work microwave Chicken Byriani
Long way to go from Los Angeles, must have been a blindin' byrianai!
skyscraper101
0891 50 50 50
LOL I moved back to London in 2015 yo.
The Indian food in LA was largely shite by comparison, mind. And I couldn't get Ribena.
Bahnhof Strasse
Met up with Hannah Courtoy a week next Tuesday
cupid_stunt
Chief seagull hater & farmerbarleymow's nemesis.
Looks like it's just five convenience stores, four are being taken-over by the Co-op:
Co-op and Aldi to buy Waitrose stores after John Lewis profit warning
It was heaven for us operators of pirate radio stations, back in the day.
Meanwhile, despite plenty of empty shops, it looks like Worthing is doing OK compared to other towns:
Not sure when it became a city, perhaps the twats over at the Brighton Argus could confirm that?
Brighton and Worthing buck the trend in national shops survey
hash tag
Books, not bombs
Fortunately, the news appears to be all over this at the moment. Jeff Banks was on the radio this morning saying it's all down to the money spent on tech and the time it consumes meaning consumers are spending less ie the cost and time of subscription television services, mobile phones Etc.
here's a little selection, starting with an old friend: Amazon given tax boost by Government just as 50,000 people lose high street jobs
The FT has an article about crippling rates (subscription only)
Fury as high street shops to pay FOUR TIMES as much in business rates as online retailers
Anger as town centre shops forced to pay FOUR TIMES as much in business rates as online giants | Daily Mail Online
ROBERT HARDMAN: For 100 years, Binns and M&S stood on Darlington High Street - now they’re closing | Daily Mail Online
Five ways the high street can save itself (and one way the Government can)
Our high streets are reaching crisis point – both government and consumers must do more
High Street woes hit 22,000 jobs in 2018
Still, you pays your money you takes your choice.
I suppose the question now is do we still want shops and a high street?
here's a little selection, starting with an old friend: Amazon given tax boost by Government just as 50,000 people lose high street jobs
The FT has an article about crippling rates (subscription only)
Fury as high street shops to pay FOUR TIMES as much in business rates as online retailers
Anger as town centre shops forced to pay FOUR TIMES as much in business rates as online giants | Daily Mail Online
ROBERT HARDMAN: For 100 years, Binns and M&S stood on Darlington High Street - now they’re closing | Daily Mail Online
Five ways the high street can save itself (and one way the Government can)
Our high streets are reaching crisis point – both government and consumers must do more
High Street woes hit 22,000 jobs in 2018
Still, you pays your money you takes your choice.
I suppose the question now is do we still want shops and a high street?
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
Consumers must do more?
No we fucking mustn't. I don't owe Topshop a fucking thing.
No we fucking mustn't. I don't owe Topshop a fucking thing.
newbie
undisambiguated
is that because since about 2007 you've bought all of your gadgets from amazon or play.com?
That's not a particularly serious question, but your post made me think of when I migrated my gadgets and bits buying to TCR and then turned round one day and realised that the Edgeware Road had been hollowed out and only a pastiche of Henrys was left.
pesh
Well-Known Member
nope, i get most of mine secondhand, but thats not really helping either.
to be fair the electronics shops on TCR fucked themselves over in the early 00s when they started price fixing everything so there was no point in going between the shops looking for the cheapest deal available, the first price you got was the only price you got on a lot of stuff.
to be fair the electronics shops on TCR fucked themselves over in the early 00s when they started price fixing everything so there was no point in going between the shops looking for the cheapest deal available, the first price you got was the only price you got on a lot of stuff.
newbie
undisambiguated
yes I agree. I used to stand in the big newsagent getting a base price from the mail order ads in What HiFi, then go and haggle. But gradually the shops became less specialist geek and more mainstream commodity as China started sending huge ships full of gadgets and there was a glut.
NoXion
Craicy the Squirrel
If my wages actually rose with inflation rather than lagging behind it, and if the cost of living wasn't quite so fucking ridiculous, then I might be inclined to spend more of my disposable income on the high street. As opposed to spending what little I have on the internet, where prices are cheaper.
Artaxerxes
Look out, he's got a gnu!
The original Westfield is expanding soon I think, I might go to the Japanese market if I can be arsed. Then again there's a little Japanese shop near picadilly that's half the price of the Japan centre and it's ilk.
God knows the Stratford Westfield is a bloody nightmare on a weekend.
cybershot
Well-Known Member
I found myself needing an Android phone because I could hack Android Auto onto my car's infotainment system (mazda 3) which is obviously useless without an Android phone. I'm an iPhone user so wanted to spend as little as possible on a device without it being unbearably slow and too low on internal memory. A difficult ask. Too difficult for the high street.
I ended up returning two phones to Argos. One didn't work out the box, was the last one they had in stock, replaced it with another model, which was just shite.
Ended up ordering off Amazon and got something that pissed all over the phones available from high street tech stores for the price i was willing to pay. As much as I wanted to use the high street, they just couldn't provide what I needed.
I ended up returning two phones to Argos. One didn't work out the box, was the last one they had in stock, replaced it with another model, which was just shite.
Ended up ordering off Amazon and got something that pissed all over the phones available from high street tech stores for the price i was willing to pay. As much as I wanted to use the high street, they just couldn't provide what I needed.
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Cid
Proper break this time
They're popular in China... And this despite China having much better on-line purchasing. But it's kind of weird, I'm not sure how many people are actually buying stuff in them. And you do get deserted malls in weird places... So there may be some kind of financial jiggery-pockery going on.
Cid
Proper break this time
Yeah, well it's not exactly surprising that people that buy tech rapidly started doing so online. And many of those shops were pretty shit. I lament the Tottenham Court road camera shops though, they were great.
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