The future of the high street

[sunnydaytoday0]

I was just reading that Boots have announced they will close 300 stores over the next year. That's a lot of stores and high streets that will be losing yet another shop. They will however still have many stores remaining so it's not as if the whole company is closing.

Is anyone else dismayed that so many big retail names have gone under ever since the financial crash 15 years ago, and that given the economic outlook that many more could do so, or like Boots more individual shops will simply close, hitting some areas hard in particular. Is it inevitable a lot of places will become complete ghost towns? In the future is it just going to be a choice for many people of the internet or travelling much further to buy whatever you might need? I guess you can include banks and post offices etc in this too.

If primark goes, God help us all.

Actually how on earth are HMV still going? Massive shop in town still open.

I don’t use Amazon on principle but shopping instore is already excessively difficult and I live in a major town. Whatever it is that you want, it seems like the shop is guaranteed to not have that thing.

At the moment I’ve been finding online shopping really frustrating too (eg Boots app seems completely broken, frustrations around clothes sizing, crappy customer service) so I’m just going to stop buying things for a while. Why do they make it so hard to give them your money?!

I wouldn’t be surprised if Boots’ estate needed a lot of pruning though - we have 2 very close together where I live and another 2 in the train station plus several more outside of the town centre. Not sure even a large town like this really needs 9x Boots.

HMV is coming back now and selling vinyl.

I’d like to see more leisure , not endless coffee shops, but a boutique cinema, different restaurants that aren’t £££, a nice wine bar . Somewhere for teens to hang out too. Games cafes are fun and the one near here even survived the pandemic .

Next do nice leather wallets at very reasonable prices

Yeah @Taylorscat they have just opened a big gaming/go kart thing in town, where the old tj Hughes was, hope it does well.

I was in Germany recently. The city we were staying in was really busy. Huge footfall, every unit was occupied, the shops were clean and well staffed. Everything was well stocked. Such a contrast to here.

300 stores is a lot!!

They haven't announced which stores but said all the stores that are closing are within 3 miles of another store.

I think that means our local high street will close as there's an all night Boots open a short distance away.

I'd also assume it means they're closing 2 of the 3 in Birmingham City Centre. Two of them are huge

I'd like to know how WHSmith is making any profit from my local store. I'm surprised it hasn't been closed down. It's not a travel store one so it's not as if it at least has a captive market.

It’s about 15% of their stores. They have over 2000!

Boots isn't just about the high street though. The pharmacy is part of the primary care service the NHS offers. It's pharmacies will serve many people with prescriptions, and deal with medications but also minor illnesses. Maybe a insect bite that someone isn't sure is infected or not or a dc who has a rash or high temprature, someone with a burn. Giving advice, medication, advising on dressings, pain relief and then signposting elsewhere if needed.

Who is going to give this advice if we're loosing so many pharmacies? (Lloyd's have also closed a lot of branches) GP? People can't get appointments already and are going to pharmacies for things they can't treat. People with either go without care to the point they need hospital admission or turn up at A&E.

This question comes up over and over again and everyone does the wide eyed dismay tut tut at the decline of the high street. Probably while scrolling for their online purchase at the same time. What the point of all this pondering? Online shopping isn’t exactly a new thing and it’s not surprise that people’s changing shopping habits are leading to this outcome.

I agree.

On our town centre, there are three big supermarkets selling everything: food, pharmacy stuff, toys, etc.. That must be having a big impact on other shops, who can’t compete with them on price.

Our Next disappeared several years ago.

Lloyds is gone, Boots might stay in my town but they are not what they once were. The pharmacy had to order in a very common medication for me, and it took three days. With one counter having to supply all the medicine that they plus two maybe three Lloyds used to, it's all going to get difficult.

I don't think it wants to be saved - I wish it did. The amount of times I've looked for something in a shop to be told they don't have it in the shop but I can order it online

And M&S still has changing rooms closed with signs saying to try at home and return to store. May as well buy online then.

Some of the commercial units should be remodelled as residential.

I used to like Boots, spent many happy hours as a teenage browsing the make up with friends, I would always pop in to a branch if I saw one for a look around, but it seems they've cut staff to the bone and its tedious spending ages waiting around to be served. I used to use the local branch for prescriptions but you'd be waiting 15 mins to be served and more often than not be told its not ready even though youve left it longer than a working week. I suspect its all to do with saving money and trying to reduce the effects of branches which aren't making decent profits but its a cycle and less people go in if there's a lack of staff. Their website is hard to use though, I'd use any site over theirs.

I do like browsing shops still, I do think some might make a comeback. Places like HMV have been very slow to adapt but I went in one earlier and they had an array of vinyl (some limited presses hard to find online), board games and all sorts of stuff- a bit like forbidden planet used to be so it's interesting to browse. Not sure how much converts to sales, but it was a decent experience- lots of space, decent music playing, clean, staff about etc. I prefer buying clothes in person but with the vast array of choice on fast fashion sites I'm not sure young people will see it as viable.

Not sure of the answer, I suspect more shops being turned into bars etc?

I moan about the loss of actual shops but the truth is I've not been into my own high street more than about twice this year. If I can't get it at a supermarket I don't bother.

We went into London today, Fenchurch St area. It was dead. Offices up for let on every street, shops closed and cafes and bars for sale and closed. The world has changed.

Shopping centres and out of town retail parks are usually busy. The issues with the high street often seem to be linked to access/parking, and crazy rents. A few places locally have closed - which were popular - but the owners all said the same thing; the combination of rents and business rates, combined with energy prices and staffing problems meant that they could not afford to keep going.

Yes, the big Marks and Spencers shut a few months ago and I wouldn't be surprised if the Next shuts too.

I live near Cheapside, and every other shop is vacant. We have two Boots branches, so am sure one will close. The Square Mile hasn't really recovered from the wfh exodus due to Covid, and that, coupled with many offices relocating completely due to Brexit means the City of London is only ever going to be a shadow of its former self.

I remember posting this thread with the news about Boots not long ago, and now the news today that Wilko is going into administration 😔