Boarded-Up Britain: One In Eight Shops Shut, worst in t'North

amcluesent

An estimated 117,000 premises in town centres are now boarded-up or empty

Most of the worst-hit high streets are in the Midlands and the North, with the highest number of empty shops in Blackpool, at 29%.

Other badly hit areas are Bradford, Wolverhampton and Doncaster, where almost a quarter of all shops are looking for tenants.

Only three of the worst 25 blackspots - in Watford, Bristol and Reading - are in the South of England.

The Local Data Company report - A Gathering Storm? - says that town centres relying heavily on public sector funding could be worst hit in the future.

FACT - grim, austerity Britain is no longer a nation of shop-assistants as school-leavers who ignore customers and snigger over nothing are left unwaged.

Graham_Devon

Poundshops & dodgy wine bars must be loving the cheap properites!

amcluesent

>Poundshops ...<

Never been in one, true to MSE I patronise the 99p Shop.

Actually t'interweb's has killed high street shopping. Why risk being mugged by feral hoodies when *.com will provide

olly300

Seriously though in every "town" centre I know there were always empty shops even during the boom years. There are only so many shops people want to go to on foot particularly if there is an out of town retail park or a large supermarket nearby.

daveyjp

A sign of things to come. A friend of mine works for a commercial agent who built their business around small shop lettings. They have just stopped dealing in small shop lettings completely. Not worth the hassle for the few hundfred quid in commission and ongoing management is a nightmare.

When I can sit at home and buy whatever I want at the press of a button why do I need to go to a shop?

This will get worse in years to come (50% of goods via internet shopping in 10-15 years is the estimate), a city centre trip will be for a day out, not to go to shops and only those centres which become 'destinations' will survive - probably no more than a dozen regional centres serving the larger conurbations, the smaller towns could wither and die.

Why go to Bradford, Dewsbury, Wakefield etc when Leeds is 10 miles away? Same for the Manchester conurbation, Birmingham, Newcastle? Shops are becoming showrooms. Go and look then use your internet enabled phone to find the best price and order online.

lemonjelly

Actually, for Wolverhampton, this is good news. We were at 25%, now we're only at 23%.

I hope this is because the properties are occupied, & not because they've knocked em down!

The internet hasn't killed the high street imo. What has actually affected the high street is the vast number of drinking establishments, & the sheer volume of drink addled idiots causing trouble on the streets for people.

One other question, could it be that there are less shops because there is less stuff worth buying?

Would love to see fc123 comment on this thread.

treliac

There will always be purchases that you want to look at first in a shop.

I've just been to look at carpet shops and discovered that 2 or the 3 in the nearest decent sized town have closed down. Leaving just one means there is reduced choice and no competition, which doesn't feel good.

nearlynew

It doesn't matter if shops are closing - they are obviosly unviable in some way.

You cannot build an economy around debt-based consumption; relying on rising real estate price rises to fuel an economy always was and always will be madness.

Wealth is built by making and doing stuff not borrowing and buying stuff.

To get out of the mess we are in requires production and saving not consumption and borrowing.

dopester

treliac wrote: »

There will always be purchases that you want to look at first in a shop.

I've just been to look at carpet shops and discovered that 2 or the 3 in the nearest decent sized town have closed down. Leaving just one means there is reduced choice and no competition, which doesn't feel good.

Well if the rents are lowered by landlords of some of the boarded up shops, to attract in new businesses or start-ups.. there might be good competition and more potential for profit .

Also, I've got little against the business which has managed to keep running whilst others are closing down. Perhaps they've made wise decisions, have savings in reserve ect.

It's not just shops though... offices, warehouses ect.

Last Sunday:

dopester wrote: »

Certainly I'm just back from Wilmslow today and was knocked out by the amount of commercial property To Let signs.

Graham_Devon

I can't be bothered paying car parking charges to shop in a town.

Neither can I be bothered finding I have no change and the machine doesn't give change. In this day and age, I ask you. Everything is a fiver nowadays. Who has change? Why don't these machines accept notes?! Or is a card too much to ask? Oh no, theres a reason they don't like cards...

And I'm flumoxed as to why the machines that don't give change always seem to be priced at £1.10 for an hour, £2.05 for 2 hours. If I wasn't so trusting, I'd assume they just wanted you to chuck 3 quid in cus they know no one has change and walk away without mumbling to yourself. This is the sole reason they created £2 coins. For the £2.05p tarrifs at the car park to shaft you even mre. But I'll be damned if I'm not going to mumble. (See, cards would scupper this thieving behaviour).

And it's not tax efficient either. I use parking for work mainly. You put 3 quid in, and it spits out a receipt for £2.05. Only one car park does this, but it's a ploy to just take even more tax off me at the end of the year. That 95p that suddenly dissapeared into thin air was tax deductable. It's not if it doesn't exist anymore! It's pure out theft. You can see why I mumble.

For the privalige of all this nonsense, I come back to a car thats been decorated in adverts where people have taken it upon themselves to play with my wipers. The canny ones put the adverts in the gutter thing under the windscreen so you can't see it....so that half way down the road you get paper fly up into the middle of your screen. Put the wipers on in a panic and it just makes it worse. What view you DID have before with the paper in one place, has now been reduced to an intermittent view. I mumble lots then.

I don't really like it to be honest. So I go to tesco and mumble there.

nearlynew

Slightly off tangent there Dev, but I agree - very annoying.