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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To feel sad about greedy landlords and the high street?

40 replies

malificent7 · 03/09/2018 12:33

So my local New Look is closing. Not the best shop in the world but I am not really into the expensive Fat Face/Boden/ Sea Salt / White stuff look and DD LOVES it. They are closing because of sky high rents on the high street. I guess I am gutted as it is the one clothes shop in my small town. The shop assistants are devastated and have no jobs to go to.
I really hope it is replaced by something like H and M which is affordable. Likewise, House of Frazer is closing shops. I can see why as I feel their model is outdated and expensive but I am sad for those who loose their jobs.
I guess there are some shops that are thriving...I LOVE the Works and thankfully they seem to be thriving. BHS was no loss to me but aibu to feel that it is a shame that shops are closing due to sky high rents?

At the same time retailers do need to up their game and keep up with fashions. I just wonder what our high streets will look like in 10 years time.

OP posts:
DGRossetti · 03/09/2018 16:31

The high street is struggling a lot in my town in North Jersey USA.

Which suggests a global malaise - not just the UK which generally tends to lead trends ....

Want2bSupermum · 03/09/2018 16:47

It's a global problem but not one which can't be managed. Some towns in North Jersey are doing well. They have low rates and introduced rent control to commercial leases. Most importantly they have free parking and valet parking during December.

jasjas1973 · 03/09/2018 16:47

@DGRossetti
From a respected market analyst "Retailers in the rest of Europe, including Germany and France, have so far been spared large-scale closures, partly due to a much lower market share to date for online retailers, as well as less over-indebted domestic consumers"

Its no good saying "life isn't fair" Government is there to make sure it becomes fair! Regulating rent and rates is very easy.

Perhaps the planning system could be used to force companies to pay taxes on UK sales? as would European co-op on tax evasion ... though that boat may have sailed.

Empty high streets benefit no-one, they can become dens of crime and cost us more in the longer run, as we lose business rates and tax revenues

DGRossetti · 03/09/2018 16:57

Its no good saying "life isn't fair" Government is there to make sure it becomes fair!

Is it ? Has anyone told them ?

"Retailers in the rest of Europe, including Germany and France, have so far been spared large-scale closures, partly due to a much lower market share to date for online retailers, as well as less over-indebted domestic consumers"

"so far" ....

Empty high streets benefit no-one, they can become dens of crime and cost us more in the longer run, as we lose business rates and tax revenues

I can't help but wonder if this is what happened when trains supplanted canals, and cars supplanted horses ? Were there people watching stables, mews, farriers, saddlers, blacksmiths, trainers, stable boy, grooms, coachmen all slowly losing their livelihoods saying "it'll get better" ? Because that's how I see things now.

Look how "work" has changed in my lifetime .... when I started my first "proper" job in 1985, the company still had a typing pool.

Of course, out of the decline of the horse-led era, blacksmiths become motor mechanics, coachbuilders became car manufactures, etc etc.

Plus ca change ?

All I know is, any misty-eyed attempt to ensure the equine era somehow remained untouched by progress and preserved in aspic were doomed to fail.

(I also think the era of personal motor transport will prove to be ephemeral, but that's a different subject).

By the way it's not that I'm saying you're necessarily wrong. But we're never going back to how things were.

Defrack · 03/09/2018 17:30

You say closing town centres cost jobs, but then what does online shopping do? Create jobs.

All the warehouse staff, that Amazon centre in Doncaster provides a lot of jobs.
All the businesses that can sell over Amazon, creating jobs.
All the delivery and lorry driver jobs created.

continuallychargingmyphone · 03/09/2018 17:31

New look isn’t going anywhere but there are a lot of branches and as such some are closing.

Chickencellar · 03/09/2018 17:50

bunbun
That's not the case anymore with rates councils get their own rates back. The government used to pass it back with top ups for poorer councils it got tapered out. I know some got walloped hard by this same with council tax , some got top ups now gone.

topcat2014 · 03/09/2018 17:59

In a lot of cases, the 'greedy landlord' is actually a pension fund - so we all lose out.

But, the fact is the building is valued as an asset according to the rent it can charge. It is better for the landlord to have a longer void period thank acknowledge his rent is too high.

Every £1000 off the rent would probably take £20,000 off the capital value of the building.

topcat2014 · 03/09/2018 17:59

THAN acknowlege...

jasjas1973 · 03/09/2018 18:01

All the warehouse staff, that Amazon centre in Doncaster provides a lot of jobs
All the businesses that can sell over Amazon, creating jobs.
All the delivery and lorry driver jobs created.

Really?
Wh smith and all the others had warehouses, in any case much of these warehouses are now automated.
The business that sell over amazon still could sell over the 'net, i'm not suggesting we go back to a Littlewoods catalogue!
All those vans driving around the UK, create other problems eg Accidents, congestion and air quality, esp as these vans are diesel, problems that have to be fixed out of general taxation.

DRG, Your typing pool area can be replaced with an IT dept or similar, the High street doesn't really have many other uses, maybe housing but as you d still have some shops, it isn't ideal.

I am just suggesting that players like Amazon pay their taxes, pay the same level of business rates and perhaps just as importantly pay staff and contractors wages that do not mean they have to claim WTC etc, whilst they move profits overseas, that applies equally to all companies

In other words a Level playing field.

jay55 · 03/09/2018 18:10

People who worked on the high
Street but can’t drive(or can’t afford to run a car) end up shit out of luck for jobs. Town centres have public transport, warehouses and distribution centres in the middle of nowhere don’t tend to.

Chickencellar · 03/09/2018 18:23

But those vans replace cars that aren't going into the town centre or anywhere , so swings and roundabouts.
A number of DC I've seen have staff buses for people who don't have cars.

GoodNewsTwo · 03/09/2018 20:10

I don't think that's why they are shutting. I went to bullring the other day and there is a new look in there. I dread to think the the rent is...

jasjas1973 · 03/09/2018 21:12

But those vans replace cars that aren't going into the town centre or anywhere , so swings and roundabouts

Not really because they are far more polluting (aerodynamics, weight, technology) and people still go shopping but buy less, car use is still very much on the increase, easily the highest in Europe, or have you noticed less cars on the roads lol!

Chickencellar · 03/09/2018 21:52

Not sure there is any scientific way to prove one way or the other. But I go shopping less in total, if say 10 people in my part of town did the same and ordered on the internet that would be less mileage. Car usage might be on the increase but I believe it would be even higher without internet shopping.
When you say the highest in Europe by what metric ?

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