What kind of shop/service are you most lacking where you live?

[MDM]

Can be anything from kids' shoe fitting to play area to classes of some sort?

Due to redundancy, trying to identify gaps in the market that can't be eroded by Internet sales!

Surely that will depend on where we are though?

I really miss our village post office. I have to get the car out and drive 20 mins to the nearest one now

Yes tabula, just looking for a general theme for the mo.

Stuff to do indoors on a rainy day with school aged kids.

Round here there is loads for toddlers, but nothing for older kids/families.

I'd like to be able to do something resembling exercise but my one-year-old DD makes this tricky.
Also would be good to be able to hire things like baby-bike-seats (try-before-you-buy!) or those v expensive prams that you can use if you're a runner.

Anything to do with young kids, that isn't soft play, on a rainy day. The soft play places are nice, which is good, but it would be fab to have more options - but I don't know what really.

Agree with SarkyWench and ChippingIn, we need more indoor stuff to take the kids to. In the US they have loads of Children's Museums which are not really museums at all but hands-on places where kids can play shops, with water, build and race cars, build marble runs, play in a pretend forest, on a ship, etc. It is loosely scientific but loads of fun. I fear they are probably very expensive to set up though. The closest thing I've found to where I live is 360 Play, which has softplay, dodgems, carousel, dress-ups, pretend vet, pretend pizza shop and lego indoors plus climbing wall, sandpit, pedal boats and cars outside in the Summer.

Loving the Children's Museum idea. I agree, something different to the bog standard soft play would be great in the UK. It would be a lot of work (and cash) to set up, but surely you could earn a living from it?

Perhaps just a simple baby equipment hire shop Bumperella? I know people like new, but the second-hand clothes/toy idea is taking off down here...why not equipment too?

A reasonably-priced and knowledgeable greengrocer. Or an artisan baker that bakes proper bread. A local independent bookshop as ours has just closed.

Oh no Chelsea, what happened to the book shop? Erosion by online?

Are you thinking of a city, a town, out of town...?

I live in an urban residential area. I can't think of anything the city centre lacks. On my local high street, we have lots of takeaways, couple of greengrocers, butchers, bakeries, florists, several hairdressers/beauty salons. I would adore a bookshop, but I think you'd be mad to open one in this climate if that wasn't your absolute passion. We are really lacking a nice coffee shop. That is something that definitely can't be outsourced and that seems to be getting more popular. Obviously it should have free wifi and good coffee.

If you're looking for a family business, I've been to one place where the coffee shop had a soft play in the back. The soft play area was staffed, so parents were completely free to have a meal/ coffee/ do some work while children were entertained. In the evenings, you could bring your own bottle of wine and have dinner with the kids, then let them run off for an hour while you had some grown up time. Bliss! We have lots of ordinary soft plays, but I thought this was a cut above as it had a genuinely nice atmosphere and reasonable food. It was also on the high street, so fit in with people going shopping etc, rather than an out of town warehouse.

If you don't have a particular business in mind, why don't you tell us what your local area offers and lacks and we can think of ideas from there?

Shops that sell boys clothes (age 9 - 14).