Death of the department store

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I think John Lewis will be ok as they're a company that people are loyal too.

I would say Debenhams is a good shout but I'm basing that purely on me never using them.

I wouldn't be surprised to see a big travel agent go, at least from the high street and maybe a lower-mid clothing shop like River Island. I wonder how Curry's PC World are getting on.

PostRe: Death of the department store by **Rubix** » Mon Sep 17, 2018 8:37 am

Debenhams Ismade up of different stores so it should be okay

NickSCFC

KK wrote:And to think, both John Lewis and Marks and Spencer are the cornerstones of the new Westfield that’s about to be built next year in Croydon for a 2023 opening. Craziness.

I recently visited Westfield Stratford which, I thought at the time, was the largest shopping centre in the country.

Turns out there's actually another Westfield in London that's even bigger :shock:

NickSCFC

Qikz wrote:
lex-man wrote:
Corazon de Leon wrote:Smart money has to be on House of Fraser really.

Surely they'll survive now they've been bought out.

I mean look at Game, they got bought out and went back into administration again. Then got bought again.

Same shitty shop.

There seems to be more merchandise than games in there these days.

Have noticed a few of the larger stores have eSports going on, maybe that's the future of the brand.

NickSCFC wrote:
KK wrote:And to think, both John Lewis and Marks and Spencer are the cornerstones of the new Westfield that’s about to be built next year in Croydon for a 2023 opening. Craziness.

I recently visited Westfield Stratford which, I thought at the time, was the largest shopping centre in the country.

Turns out there's actually another Westfield in London that's even bigger

Not been to Westfield London but it is substantially bigger than Westfield Stratford City.

Rank Shopping Centre City/Town Region Area (m2) Annual visitors
1 Westfield London Shepherd's Bush, London Greater London 241,547[1] 27.3 million (2016)[2]
4 Westfield Stratford City Stratford, London Greater London 175,000[6] 42 million [7]

PostRe: Death of the department store by **Bunni** » Mon Sep 17, 2018 10:02 am

Rubix wrote:Debenhams Ismade up of different stores so it should be okay

They tend to operate in bigger towns so most of the concessions will have an actual store with more stock and choice nearby. I sometimes look if topshop doesn’t have a size I’m after but I’d always go to the bigger store for selection.

I can't see John Lewis going any time soon, by all accounts it's a very well run business and they pretty much own a whole sector of the market to themselves.

I can see House of Fraser continuing to struggle for a while, they may survive in a depleted form but they are going to need to alter what they offer and how it is presented as there is little reason to choose them over other similar stores and nobody really has any "brand loyalty" to them in the way they might with other big stores (e.g. John Lewis).

I don't know what it's like in other parts of the country but the local high street here is such a depressing sight at the moment. Loads of closed down shops, plenty more that are on the brink, and loads of crap filling the gaps like pound shops, e-cigarette places, bargain travel agents, and betting shops. And this is all before we hit the real shit-storm that will be the Brexit fallout. :fp:

Corazon de Leon

The high street in my closest self-contained town(Kirkintilloch) is a brutal mix of charity shops, bargain nonsense and takeaways, but Glasgow city centre is doing fairly well.

The town I live in doesn't have a high street because it is basically a suburb of Glasgow - I can jump in my car and be in the city centre in ten minutes. Our relatively crappy local centre consists of a Morrisons, two travel agents, three chemists, three banks, three pubs, a discount store, a charity shop and half a dozen takeaways.

I remember the good old days, when we had a WH Smith and video shops. :slol:

PostRe: Death of the department store by **Preezy** » Mon Sep 17, 2018 10:41 am

I remember when I were a lad, our local parade of shops had a dry cleaners that also rented out videos (obvious synergies there :slol:

), and my sister and I would often go in and get free movie posters that we'd stick on our wall. The high street, and shops in general, are so gooseberry fool nowadays, I hate it.

I think that all of the department stores are on borrowed time. If they want to survive a little longer they need to work together - they know they are struggling so don't have more than one in a town/shopping centre

Blackpool centre is utterly horrifying these days. They've desperately been trying to diversify for years, ever since the Super Casino idea fell apart in the early 2000s, and the latest gamble was trying to poach some of the shopping crowd from Preston. Cue a complete revamp of the Houndshill indoor shopping centre with shops from all the usual suspects, including a Debenhams.

What this has done is drive all the named brands inside. Cheap and nasty poundshops and kebab places have bought the outside shopfronts made vacant by TopMan and the like, and a huge number stand dormant and empty. The whole centre looks like its dying.

Houndshill is much better, but its come at the expense of the rest of the town centre. I can't imagine what would happen if the Debenhams left.

Corazon de Leon

Glasgow seems to have done alright out of the apparent death of the high street - there are three good sized shopping centres outside of the city in Braehead, Silverburn and the inexplicably outdoor Fort. The centre and west end also have fairly well equipped shopping districts as well.

Only a few years ago Blackpool had a GAME and a Grainger Games next door to each other and an independent mainly music shop that also sold games on the next corner, and there was CEX and HMV too. So I used to think it was brilliant

PostRe: Death of the department store by **Jenuall** » Mon Sep 17, 2018 1:52 pm

Back when I lived in Cardiff we had three GAME stores on the same street at one point, one at either end and then another in the middle inside a Debenhams if I remember rightly. Throw in all the other entertainment and technology shops you used to see around and the high street was actually an interesting and viable place to shop!

PostRe: Death of the department store by KK » Mon Sep 17, 2018 2:04 pm

Debenhams used to have a fantastic VHS section in the late 90s. One of their stores I remember had a yellow New York taxi cab smashing through a brick wall right next to an EB concession. Bloody brilliant it was.

Kids today won’t ever know how cool things like that and Blockbuster were...and their overpriced popcorn and drinks.

PostRe: Death of the department store by **Lex-Man** » Mon Sep 17, 2018 2:08 pm

Southend has been a hole since I've lived here. There is a massive empty BHS and a Blockbusters. It seems to be getting worse as a home bargains store, KFC and pound shop have all recently closed down.

There is a shopping centre near my work but there is nothing it. They had a Argos but that just moved into Sainsbury's. The whole high street is also full of homeless people hanging around in shop doorways. It's really depressing.

A lot of local people think the council is planning on converting the whole high street into blocks of flats.

PostRe: Death of the department store by **Jenuall** » Mon Sep 17, 2018 2:10 pm

KK wrote:Debenhams used to have a fantastic VHS section in the late 90s. One of their stores I remember had a yellow New York taxi cab smashing through a brick wall right next to an EB concession. Bloody brilliant it was.

Kids today won’t ever know how cool things like that and Blockbuster were...and their overpriced popcorn and drinks.

I remember 20 odd years ago the basement level (which had the toys and computer games amongst other things) in Debenhams Gloucester had a massive refurbish to be like some coherent "world" throughout. It was genuinely impressive and must have cost loads but it didn't last long as a concept.

PostRe: Death of the department store by KK » Mon Sep 17, 2018 2:30 pm

Sutton high street in South West London is another example of a noticeable decline. You start up at the train station/Post Office/massive new apartments and you walk down and it gradually just gets worse and worse until you reach ASDA at the other end, past a Polish shop (some great stuff in there, BTW), a truly God-awful pub..and quite possibly the most inconspicuous Sainsbury’s store anywhere. Maybe because I always seem to end up there on a cloudy day it comes across even more miserable. I suppose it says something when the highlight of the trip is a Wilko, and a perpetually empty GAME. And for some reason there are two Poundland’s at either end selling what appears to be the exact same stuff. I swear there used to be a Pizza Hut and HMV as well but they have vanished.

Remnants of what used to be Poundworld and BHS laying empty however. The upper deck of their shopping centre is empty too.

It is sad to see, but I don’t think ploughing money at it always helps either. Fact is people just like doing more and more sat indoors.

NickSCFC wrote:Turns out there's actually another Westfield in London that's even bigger

I've been to the White City one (though that was before they extended it) and it really is massive.

As far as my town is concerned though, all we get new these days is charity shops and barbers, even some of the banks have closed.

KK wrote:past a Polish shop (some great stuff in there, BTW)

I stumble across these from time to time, they often sell raspberry jaffa cakes, and some of the polish biscuits and cakes are amazing.

I think one of the contributing factors behind the decline of the high street is the increasing number of retail parks outside of towns and cities. There's at least three within reasonable driving distance of Chesterfield and they're nearly always rammed full of people even during the week - it's great for large chains like PC World, Tesco and the like but smaller local shops are simply vanishing as a result.

Death of the department store

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