AIBU to not be surprised the High Street is Dying?

[MythicalKings]

A few weeks ago I bought a pair of shoes in a store in town. This is a real find for me because I have trouble finding comfy shoes.

So I decided to buy a couple more pairs in different colours. I had 25 minutes before I had to get the next bus home. I went into the store this morning and there was only one assistant serving. Usually there are 3 or more. She was serving a lady struggling to find something to suit her. I wandered around the shop looking at other shoes then spent a few minutes deciding which colours to buy the new pairs in. I had no acknowledgement of my presence at all. Not a smile or an "I'll be with you in a minute" or even a "Hello".

Meanwhile I could hear that there was someone in the stock room moving around. I went to stand at the counter to wait. A woman came out of the stock room with some shoes which she gave to the other assistant and went back into the stockroom. She had to walk past me twice but didn't make eye contact at all.

Still the woman hadn't found anything to suit but was chatting away to the assistant about her holidays and other chit chat. I am aware that I am not the most patient person in the world and that the other woman had a perfect right to take as long as she liked to choose her shoes but I had been in the shop at least 10 minutes and no one who worked there had said a word to me. More time passed.

The assistant came up to the till, where I was still standing, with the shoes the woman had chosen. The woman was putting her shoes on. The assistant said she'd serve me as soon as she had finished with the other customer. No "Sorry for the wait", no "I hope you don't mind if I serve this lady first". Not even a smile.

So I said, very calmly, "Never mind, I'll go somewhere else." And I missed my bus anyway.

I've been able to find them cheaper online so have ordered them.

So AIBU to think that this is the sort of attitude that is killing High St shops?

Norah Where have you been? I forget how many years it is since councils set business rates - they are uniform across England, or perhaps E and W or even GB; I don't know which but certainly England.

And once all the shops have given up and gone you'll be left with those bargains online - or will there be bargains online as there will be one or two huge companies controlling choice, price, availability, everything. And we'll all be manipulated and stuffed!!!!

That's what they said about supermarkets which are very competitive with each other. It's the same old attempt to persuade us not to spend our money where it will go farthest for us.

If you want to succeed in bricks-and-mortars retail as an independent you have got to be shit-hot in terms of service and location because you can't beat online on price.

Shockers, that is shocking! A great example of how , with a bit of oomph, they could have made a killing. their loss and if the shop shuts down they will blame the internet.

Yanbu. I get really hacked off shopping in town but for other reasons. Shops don't seem to hold much stock any more and it has to be ordered its so annoying! This has been the case repeatedly for shoes and TVs I have tried to buy!
I am really struggling with my city centre now as they no longer cater for less than size 10. I give up and shop online

The80s - boak at mall public loos - nightmare

I live close to a city but rarely shop there because the car park charges are extortionate.
A big shopping centre near me has very cheap car park charges so I shop there.

It seems like I am in the minority here when I go shopping because I always get good service and helpful and friendly staff.

Perhaps I shop when it is less busy. I have worked in retail and can remember how tiring it is to be on your feet all day. I have also worked in sales and can remember how much easier it was to be nice when my customers were nice to me. So I am polite and friendly towards the sales staff and inevitably find they are the same towards me.

Having said all that I know how frustrating it is having to stand for ages in a queue snaking all the way round a shop because they don't have enough staff to man the tills - I'm looking at you New Look.

Myri Surely Raspberry Pis have only been on the mkt 5 mins. once they sell big time why would amazon or whoever not up their range??

Andrew The choice in supermarkets is not good - in Tesco you can buy Tesco stuff, in Lidl various foreign options. The competition makes them cheap but not nice quality imo.

All in all I ended up £2.50 down from parking, plus the time and diesel to drive there and back

Errrrr - that is what shopping involves, unless you grow wings, you drive to the town and park in the parking lot which errrr involves diesel and money.
No, you're right much better if we all sit at home on our ownsome shopping online.

I work full time Monday - Friday and often Saturday too. I would not normally choose to shop at the weekend so most of it is online.

Many of us just have less time to shop on the High Street.

Another thing is that the times you actually need to pick things up in store on that very day (when headphones accidentally break) or you don't have any twine to make a roast, stores are closed! I once ran around town looking for items on a Sunday and nothing was open! I usually just order stuff like that on Amazon. I don't know why stores open all day on a Tuesday but then are closed on Sunday!

once they sell big time why would amazon or whoever not up their range??

Because it requires some product knowledge to select interesting things. That's what you're getting in buying from specialists.

The best service I've had recently was ordering in new look but that's in a small precinct I walked to on a quiet Monday. The staff were fab though.

I buy things online which I cannot locally. Is that so bad?

"Because it requires some product knowledge to select interesting things. That's what you're getting in buying from specialists."

This

When I bought my camera I went to Jessops where a very helpful salesman talked me through the options. I negotiated a good deal with him and bought it from them. I might have paid £5 less for the camera online, but I wouldn't have had someone talk through the various other options with me or show me how to use it, and I wouldn't have had 200 free prints either.

Also, I would have felt it was unethical to get someone from the shop to do all the work for me to then and buy it from Amazon.

I think the high street has adapted though in some ways, and it's the things that you're all complaining about that are getting the punters in. A few people have mentioned the 'deafening' music in shops such as Office , but every time I go in there it's absolutely rammed with folk buying and has a good atmosphere. So while you mind find it massively irritating, I think they're probably finding it's pulling more people in than they're losing.

I don't do any online shopping at all, do most of my food and clothes shopping in the town centre and occasionally bulk-buy heavier items in a supermarket slightly further away with the car.

In our town, people often say the town centre isn't doing well because parking is too expensive. But our town has extremely good public transport links. I can walk from where I live but often get the bus back if I have heavy shopping. I don't actually know anybody in the town itself who doesn't live close to a bus route. Obviously for people in outlying villages it might be easier to go to the big out-of-town shops but I can't see why people in the town are avoiding the centre. The only major shop we have completely lost to out-of-town is M&S, and we have three other decent food shops in the centre.

It annoys me a bit that people won't use the town centre because it's OK for people like me - I have a choice, and could go to the out-of-town shops by car or order online if I wanted too - I just prefer the real-life interaction ad atmosphere of the town centre and being able to try things on. But there are people who have no choice - people who haven't got a car or a computer - and if all the people who do have a choice start boycotting the town centre, so that the shops and perhaps the bus services eventually get taken away, those people are going to be completely stuffed.

I agree with you op I went to buy something today and the shops just don't want to take your money. I had to leave the item I went to buy because the queue was just too long and the town centre car parking penalises people for spending too long in town!

But there are people who have no choice - people who haven't got a car or a computer

Attempting to guilt-trip people into going to shops that they otherwise wouldn't is hardly a long-term strategy.

I get (probably irrationally) annoyed by the bad service I seem to get wherever I shop. At the weekend in Waitrose, I stood patiently with my toddler waiting for the guys behind the meat counter to finish their conversation before I was served. Then as I was getting some bread i heard every word of a loud conversation between 2 staff on how much their bonuses were. Regularly in Tesco I'm shopping next to staff packing the shelves discussing personal stuff, swearing loudly. It's the main reason I stopped shopping there so often. I have been in clothes shops before with staff next me talking about how drunk they got the night before. I much prefer the internet where I can browse and shop without getting pissed off with stuff like that. And I worked in retail for many years when I was younger so completely sympathise with how hard the job is, crappy customers etc but a lot of staff just seem oblivious of any professionalism these days.

Thanks for the replies, I'm glad most people don't think I was BU. It's such a shame, I used to love High St shopping. It's becoming more and more of a chore.

This is one of my most frequent moans. I do plenty of online shopping but often just want to walk into a shop and buy something. Stock levels are so low, and I hate being told I can order online. l know that, I would have done that if I wanted to! M and S is the worst. No matter what age my son is, they've always sold out of his size . I can't even buy a bottle green school jumper there because they don't stock that colour in-store even though a local school has that colour uniform.
Rant over, i feel better now, thanks

The high street is dying for a number of reasons. Just a few of the contributing factors are:

1. lower prices online due to higher bulk buying power made possible by lack of premium rent costs on high streets

1. opening times - I work full time - when do I have time to go to a high street whose shops are open between 9 and 5? I do it online like many other full time workers

1. linked to the above - Sunday trading. If you're only open between 9 and 5 in the week, then being forced to close early on a Sunday wont help matters

1. inaccessibility and parking issues - many high streets now struggle with parking and many more rural high streets are difficult to access for those people who actually have time to go

1. Higher rental prices on commercial premises in town centres

1. out of town shopping centres and retail parks - now that many of these contain your basic high street shops, its just so much more convenient.

Mcnorton I feel your pain with marks - the one near me is a flagship and still shambolic with the stock and I would still prefer to buy my school uniforms and all the dds underwear there. They have no excuse.

I refuse to feel guilty about not town centre shopping. I don't mind the parking price it's that there's nothing to buy when I get there!!!

That said I work in a much smaller market town and spend hundreds on their lovely pedestrianised high street which is about half independent shops. You can't buy kids clothes there (only peacocks) but everything else and with service with a smile and a random gossip usually as I've worked there years and so have most shop staff. God I love it :-)

The worst high street shop for rude staff is Laura Ashley - awful staff in my local shop!

I don't think it is always bad news. I have received excellent service in high street stores

Some (not all) independent shops take the biscuit. In the last few months I've had: One specialist shop never answering emails about c.£300 worth of business, and another not bothering to put on its website that it was closed for an entire week. And they wonder why people don't shop there..!