High street’s fate is being sealed by shoppers’ choices

Christmas shopping done? All wrapped and under the tree?

We imagine most of our readers will, by now, be well ahead of the game and have their gift-buying well in hand.

And, for many, like lots of other people, you will have bought many of those items online.

Indeed, the way we now shop couldn’t be better illustrated than by the trends seen in the run-up to Christmas this year.

But that seismic change is coming at a huge cost. Retailers are reporting their worst festive period on record.

Empty shopping centres and quiet high streets have forced them into panic sales, with prices being slashed to new lows.

That’s great news for the customer, some may argue. But it’s not great if you are one of the hundreds of thousands of people employed in retail jobs up and down the country.

Fewer customers means fewer shops which, in turn, means fewer staff.

And let’s not forget that money that was spent locally ended up in those workers’ pockets in the form of wages.

Those workers then, in turn, spent that money locally on various goods.

Shops and shopping are just one area of life that is being transformed by the rise of digital technology.

More often than not, robots can now do the jobs previously handled by manual workers.

Careful consideration must now be given to what the world will look like in many years to come.

But what happens to the traditional town centre that once buzzed with shoppers and traders?

More often than not, they are now full of bookies and charity shops.

And what happens to those people who relied on retail for their livelihood?

The answer doesn’t lie just with those running firms but also with customers who can choose where they shop.