How has your high street changed?

[wiggydiggy]

High streets will thrive if there’s a market for instant demand services. Beauty, cafe, coffee, pharmacy. High end will also support butchers, fish mongers etc. a thriving restaurant community will also survive. Anything people can wait for 2 days will struggle.
Less affluent areas will also do well with groceries and local provisions as these might be areas with a population with less access to transport or where cash is more widely used.

Described my high street almost exactly there. New cafes and bars have opened, the greengrocer closed but the butcher is ok. I was reading some reviews of a local cafe online and there is more tourism that I would have thought, I must take my high street for granted a little but for others it's a nice (IMHO!) place to visit.

 

[vickster]

Our high street too.
Its now a mix of Barbers, Estate Agents, food/coffee joints, Nail bars and Charity Shops along with a good few empty units
Even our Wetherspoons has closed down.

You say that like it's a bad thing...Sutton had two Wetherspoons, one unfortunately still exists but easy to avoid as there are other more genial places to drink. Another pub went too in the last year or two.
We seem to have lots of fast food/burger places, BK & Wendy's have both opened in the last month or so, plus a new Japanese place (there's already Kokoro). Plus McDs, KFC, Taco Bell, two Greggs, indy and chain cafes, several greasy spoons!
More Asian / Eastern European grocery places (+ Halal butchers) recently

I actually don't mind Sutton HS as a place to mooch/shop There are some empty units but it's always pretty busy, at least 9am-6pm!
There's also lots of supermarkets, big Asda, Lidl, big Sainsburys, biggish but gloomy Morrisons, big M&S with food,
No Waitrose (a little one a mile or two away), a massive Tesco a mile away too

 

[vickster]

Not sure if it Covid related but the High Street retail mix has been evolving since the rise of major malls and major supermarket chains. Butchers, Grocers, Fruiteers, Fish mongers, etc,

More Saloons, Cafes, Restaurants, Nail shops, Tattoos, Wigs, Convenience stores, Asian groceries etc

Household shopping - groceries, clothing, appliances etc are best done at Malls.

No reason to stop by High Street.

Good ole fashioned places frequented by cowboys?

 

[ianrauk]

You say that like it's a bad thing

Miss the Spoons.

 

[oldwheels]

Many things have changed but nothing to do with covid.
The Clydesdale {now Virgin ] is still here as well as a long established ironmonger and the coop. There is also a chemist { you may call it a pharmacy] and one old established hotel/pub.
Everything else has changed to tourist tat of varying quality as well as cafes.
At one time you could buy almost any domestic electrical appliance from hair driers to freezers and washing machines and a limited range of televisions. Very handy in an emergency.
Our own shop had bedding, haberdashery knitting wool and work clothing for the local market as well as tourist stuff. When we retired it turned into a local artist's studio.
The Main St toilets have turned into an ice cream shop and if caught short it could be over half a mile to the nearest 50p ones at the harbour buildings.

 

[Joey Shabadoo]

The Co-Op played a big part in killing a lot of independent businesses on Arran.

 

[Moodyman]

Our local high street has died most banks gone, Wilko gone, they even knocked the jobs centre down - so ironic!!

Shipley?

 

[wiggydiggy]

Our local high street has died most banks gone, Wilko gone, they even knocked the jobs centre down - so ironic!!

I enjoy the fact that my old town has the job centre next to the wetherspoons, I'm sure the JC is keeping that wetherspoons in business!

 

[Jameshow]

Shipley?

Yeap!!

 

[Fab Foodie]

Even our Wetherspoons has closed down.

Some positives then...

Edit: TMN to @vickster

 

[Fab Foodie]

You say that like it's a bad thing...Sutton had two Wetherspoons, one unfortunately still exists but easy to avoid as there are other more genial places to drink. Another pub went too in the last year or two.
We seem to have lots of fast food/burger places, BK & Wendy's have both opened in the last month or so, plus a new Japanese place (there's already Kokoro). Plus McDs, KFC, Taco Bell, two Greggs, indy and chain cafes, several greasy spoons!
More Asian / Eastern European grocery places (+ Halal butchers) recently

I actually don't mind Sutton HS as a place to mooch/shop There are some empty units but it's always pretty busy, at least 9am-6pm!
There's also lots of supermarkets, big Asda, Lidl, big Sainsburys, biggish but gloomy Morrisons, big M&S with food,
No Waitrose (a little one a mile or two away), a massive Tesco a mile away too

And Pearsons....

 

[vickster]

And Pearsons....

Nope, it's now Balfes (same staff mostly, different owner, but still top notch )
Pearsons only now have their MAMIL store in Sheen near Richmond Pk

 

[Ian H]

Small market town. This place used to be antiques shops, inns and pubs. Now we're down to seven pubs and one or two serious antiques places. There's the usual complement of nail bars, hairdressers and charity shops, several cafes and restaurants of varying quality, and a growing number of shops selling tat - instant landfill. But we have three good butchers, a fishmonger, two good bakers, and various food, clothing, and furniture shops. We don't have to walk more than five minutes from the front door to get pretty much all our provisions.
We're probably lucky.

 

[oldwheels]

The Co-Op played a big part in killing a lot of independent businesses on Arran.

I try to never shop in the coop as they are predatory and target specific businesses in order to close them down.
There was an attempt to open a Spar and the coop went into full on attack mode and eventually closed them down by lowering prices to ridiculous levels and then then raising them sharply after. They also closed the greengrocer, butcher and bakery by similar tactics.
In our own case for example we sold souvenir mugs from Dunoon Ceramics. The coop then placed an order for an almost identical pattern at 50p per mug less than us.
There are several other examples I could bore you with but we survived several blatant attacks. Others were not as resilient and closed down eventually.

 

[Fab Foodie]

I try to never shop in the coop as they are predatory and target specific businesses in order to close them down.
There was an attempt to open a Spar and the coop went into full on attack mode and eventually closed them down by lowering prices to ridiculous levels and then then raising them sharply after. They also closed the greengrocer, butcher and bakery by similar tactics.
In our own case for example we sold souvenir mugs from Dunoon Ceramics. The coop then placed an order for an almost identical pattern at 50p per mug less than us.
There are several other examples I could bore you with but we survived several blatant attacks. Others were not as resilient and closed down eventually.

They all do this. Tesco are playing dirty to stop Lidl store in my town....