Shopping City positive for the future despite pandemic
RUNCORN Shopping City has sounded a note of optimism for the future despite the ongoing pandemic turmoil and the challenge of adapting to the age of mega-warehouses and online shopping.
Manager Dave Pearman said the centre had been looking forward to an event-packed 2021 but these plans, including a comic convention and a charity walk, have been postponed by Covid-19, and progress delayed on a rooftop garden and allotment.
Despite the challenges of the age, he said several stores have invested and moved into bigger premises including ladies fashion retailer Mode, The Trade Quarter adult and children’s clothes shop and Have A Heart Foundation’s furniture and white goods charity shop.
Efforts to diversify in the face of ever-increasing competition from the internet are also continuing with a deal struck to host a boxing club featuring extra sports and an education centre, in addition to plans already announced for some NHS services to run from Shopping City and a rooftop garden to produce fresh food, some of which will be sold via a Community
Shop in a project aimed at tackling food poverty.
Funding has been secured for the rooftop garden and once it’s completed, Dave was confident it will be a place where people in Runcorn can go to “enjoy and relax”.
Although Covid-19 has “brought complications”, he said the scheme is “moving in the right direction” and it was “positive” that it had reached its current stage.
The centre is also to host a cultural headquarters for Halton’s 2021 Borough of Culture year, and next year will see Shopping City turn 50.
Dave added that coffee lovers can also look forward to the opening of Coffee House, when restrictions lift, as the company continues to expand its independent chain of stores currently with shopfronts in Widnes, Lymm, Sale and Partington.
Other initiatives this year include virtual coffee mornings and chats via social media with shoppers and residents to find out what they want in the centre, with Dave “quite open” to hearing people’s thoughts and ideas, and the centre could also have football pitches installed.
He is also aware of the challenges at hand, including the ongoing search for a buyer after Shopping City went into receivership in 2019 before he became manager, and the search for a tenant to take on the lease for the large former Tesco supermarket unit following the announcement of The Range’s “regrettable” upcoming move to Widnes.
Discussions with Tesco were “ongoing”, he said.
The centre manager said he was keen to see the centre looked after and to do well both as someone who lives in the area and as the manager tasked with steering its fortunes.
Dave said: “Part of the reason I took on the job is it’s really exciting despite all the challenges and things you face in work. I’m a Halton resident, I want it to be a good place and we’re working every day to try and work on making things better.”
He added: “Obviously I can see we’re in difficult times, and what we want to do is assure shoppers we’re open, we’re opening essential stores and Runcorn Shopping City is open for business. It’s the heart of the new town and we’ve served the community for 49 years. Next year we will have served the community for 50 years.”
Setting out his aim for the centre, he said: “We want to make it as good as it can be – that’s where I’m at.”