CAN MAIN STREET HOLD OUT?

Towns like Carlow are the backbone of Ireland. Today they lie almost deserted. And as its embattled shopkeepers reveal, every day that lockdown continues makes survival harder

TULLOW Street in Carlow, like most main thoroughfares in the vast majority of large towns across Ireland, has endured some serious ups and downs over the last couple of decades.

The previous recession left it visibly struggling, but in recent times, welcome signs of improvement were beginning to blossom.

Despite parking issues, and fierce competition from outlying shopping centres and retails parks, independent and family-run businesses were holding their own, working hard to keep their loyal customer base, mostly made up of people who live locally or travel in from the surrounding array of rural villages and townlands.

Several popular pubs and restaurants line the mostly straight artery. In between are dedicated men’s and ladies’ clothes and shoe shops, a cobbler and key-maker, an optician, a health food shop, a dental practice, a couple of jewellers, several hairdressers, a travel agency and, of course, a number of pharmacies.

It also has its fair share of closed premises, shops that shut long before the Covid-19 crisis hit.

Indeed it’s as typical an Irish main street as you’ll find anywhere else in the country.

And like all those other streets, filled with small to medium-sized businesses, owners and staff are wondering what the future is now going to hold for them as they slowly begin to emerge from lockdown over the next couple of months.

The general mood on Tullow Street seems to be a weary and wary sort of optimism. Everyone knows it will not be easy, there will most likely be casualties along the way, but there is at least the knowledge that pretty much everyone is in the same boat. Business is down and footfall will be a small percentage of what it was for the foreseeable.

So maybe now is the time to remind ourselves that we really are all in this together, we need each other to survive. Shopping local, supporting our neighbours and friends as they battle to stay afloat during this wildly uncertain economic time, will be the saving of us all.

For their part, they are doing everything they can to adapt and make sure their customers, themselves and their staff stay safe in process. Sanitiser stations, limited numbers on the premises at any one time and Perspex screens are all being introduced to this new way of doing commerce.

The Irish Daily Mail spoke to some of the businesses along Tullow Street to see how they are coping…