Our local high streets aren’t declining, they’re just evolving
The high street as we’ve known it is dead. It’s horrible to say but it’s true.
It is genuinely is a really sad thing to admit. With the loss of our high streets, we’re not just missing having our favourite shops in the middle of our town. We are missing that community feel. We miss the hustle and bustle, the chance meetings and the familiarity.
When your town centre had a thriving high street, no matter how small it was, you felt like you were part of something.
As our town centres decline, you increasingly feel more like you are just a suburb of the nearest city, or worse still, the nearest retail park.
Figures released this week demonstrated that this decline is showing no signs of stopping.
The first half of this year saw the largest increase in shop closures for five years.
We lost 68 stores with only 31 opening to fill the gap.
A net loss of 37 doesn’t sound that much when you think about an entire country but it really is.
Let’s say conservatively that those shops employed five people each. We haven’t just lost 37 shops, we have lost 185 jobs.
In fact, of the 11 Welsh towns and cities surveyed, only Barry didn’t suffer a net fall in shops.
Bridgend lost the highest percentage of shops at just over 4%.
This was followed by Newport, Swansea, Pontypridd and Cardiff respectively.
It is not just the fact that we are losing them, it is also the pace of it. The rate of closures was the highest for five years.
It is sad that our town centres are declining but it is hardly surprising, is it?
If the fall of our high streets is coming as a surprise, you simply haven’t been looking hard enough.
Who would want to go to them? Often dirty, with begging and drug use plentiful, some of them can hardly be described as a nice environment.
Even if you can see past that, you are still likely to pay a higher price than you could get if you ordered online.
You even get better consumer protections online with the rules on refunds. To add to that you are also going to have to pay a king’s ransom to park in a multi-storey car park which somehow always smells of urine.
Firstly, let’s look at the price.
It is more expensive to buy from a physical shop. Not just because high street retailers have to pay business rates, though that is a massive issue.
The added cost of renting, heating, decorating and staffing a shop all add to the price you pay for the thing you want.
So buying online does save you money. But the cash side isn’t what it’s all about really, is it?
Many people would gladly spend an extra three quid on their jeans to have their town back to how it once was.
The real reason to not be down about the decline of our high streets is that it offers us an immense opportunity.
People may not be coming into town as much to buy goods but this means we can offer them far better reasons to come in.
As the clothing shops start to vacate, why not use this opportunity to bring a bit of culture and sport into our centres?
Imagine if the council offered up these empty shells to local artists to exhibit their work?
Or perhaps young people could have free places to just hang around and be young.
You could have history exhibitions, allow start-ups a space for a month to test the market or a soft play area for children.
Imagine saying to local theatre companies – you can have a space to put on a performance a day.
Instead of people going into town because they need something, they would be going in out of pure curiosity about what is going on.
Because the high streets are losing shops doesn’t mean that all types of shops are struggling.
In the past six months we have lost bookmakers (due to the growth of online betting) but we have seen an increase in opticians, chocolatiers, sports goods shops and beauty salons.
Basically, everything where you need to taste or try something is still doing OK.
So don’t feel like our high streets are declining; they are not, just evolving. Let’s try to turn them into something better.