Retail: What will it take for independents' day to happen?

A shattering silence on this blog for the past couple of weeks because I’ve been up in Northumberland on holiday. There was a shattering silence there, too – in all sorts of ways.
While the rest of Britain was (I’m told) gripped by the riots frenzy there was a smashed window at a small police station somewhere near Sunderland and, er, that’s it.
I stayed in the middle of nowhere a few miles outside Alnwick. Beautiful rugged countryside, so dark only a couple of lights were visible in the distance at night, while the only noise was the distant hiss of tyres from a road up in the crags and the sheep being driven into a different field. Bliss.
It took me a few days to get used to the total absence of an internet connection and an intermittent mobile phone signal, though. But they were an early clue as to why this – and other parts of Britain - remain unspoilt.
The biggest clue was in Alnwick itself. It’s an attractive market town just off the A1 whose major draw is the Castle, where some of the exteriors for the Harry Potter movies were filmed. It’s also the only town of any size for miles around.
What struck me was how few national retail fascias there were on its main shopping streets. Yes, there was a WH Smith, a Boots, a Dorothy Perkins a Morrison supermarket and, outside the centre, a Sainsbury superstore.
But its main retail pitch was nearly all local – a butcher, a hardware store, a kitchenware and furniture business, an estate agency, the usual charity shops, a couple of pubs/bars, the odd local country clothing/fashion store, some gift/trinket shops. There is also Barter Books, which is a story in itself. A clone town it ain’t.
Is that a good or a bad thing, though?
Well, there’s been an ongoing debate about the loss of independent retailers and the dominance of national chains serving up the same flavour wherever you go. Indeed, a government-ordered review into this very subject is currently being carried out by Mary Portas, the former Harvey Nichols branding director who found fame as TV’s Mary Queen of Shops, advising independent retailers.
She’d find plenty to occupy herself in Alnwick. Some of the independents were excellent (notably the butcher, which does a damn fine pie). Some weren’t and they clearly lacked either turnover or imagination (or both).
What that translated into was that there was no compelling reason to go to Alnwick and shop for the sake of a browse and a casual purchase. The independents did not serve up the range or the consumer experience that national chains do.
I’m guessing that the national chains will tell you that the demographic data of a community as sparse as rural Northumberland simply doesn’t stack up for them. They’d ask you to hop in the car and drive down to Newcastle or hop on the train up to Edinburgh if you want the full-on shopping show.
Was my experience that of city people tragically hooked on shopping not knowing what to do? No – it was a story about the way the economy works. Major retailers need big catchments with a good wodge of money within a short drive. If it isn’t there they won’t come.
The independents who do set up shop would need to be very savvy to make good money – especially in a town like Alnwick, where tourism makes demand seasonal.
Yet they clearly survive, and there were few empty shop units that I could find.
Could the debate about independent shops learn something from a place like Alnwick? May be – but I’m not sure it’s an entirely optimistic message.
None of the independents were what I’d call indulgence shops. They were in the main places where you go because you need something. The only independent which you could really call a magnet – Barter Books, the book swap-shop housed in an old railway station – is unique, almost a national institution.
Alnwick’s independents survive because there is little competition. They are small-scale enterprises which didn’t look like they made a lot of money and they benefit from being in the only sizeable centre for miles around.
Tellingly, I suspect that the one Sainsbury store on the edge of the town employs more people than a dozen of the independents in the centre.
This isn’t an argument in favour of big retail – national chains are one-size-fits-all operations who have questions to answer about their treatment of supply chains and their regular failure to invest in great service.
But their absence doesn’t guarantee an alternative high street full of brilliantly run or endearingly quirky independents with a distinctive regional flavour. Some of the shops I saw were either utilitarian or just off the pace.
Good retailing is a mix of good products and great service coming together to provide value, and that doesn’t have to be the preserve of big national chains. But it would take a clever, committed and resourceful independent to meet those criteria.
Are they out there? I'm not sure. And the irony underneath this article is that it was drafted while sitting in Alnwick's newest retail arrival - Costa Coffee...

Walk up and smell the coffee

So we’ve got a Jamie’s Italian. There’s even a Carluccio’s And that’s on top of some heavyweight restaurant chains and fine dining establishments like Hart’s and World Service.

I’ll leave the reviews of Jamie’s and Carluccio’s to the acknowledged gourmands of the Nottingham blogosphere (that’s you, messrs Garratt and Lyle).

Instead, my own personal Christmas has come in the shape of a medio cappuccino from Costa Coffee on Lister Gate. It is the first sign that the coffee shop desert that extends all the way from Wheeler Gate down to the railway station has finally found its own oasis.

I’ve never quite understood how it was that an industry notorious for what some critics have described as carpet bombing (opening so many establishments that your rivals go out of business) has managed to ignore an entire quarter of the city centre.

Starbucks used to be on Lister Gate, but they bailed out and headed to a bigger (and less convivial) unit on the edge of the Market Square. It was, quite obviously, a numbers-driven calculation which ignored the absence of any rival outlet near Broadmarsh. So more fool them.

Anyway, enough of the silliness of a numbers-only strategy which ignores reality on the ground. Costa’s announcement that it was moving into a unit on the run down to Broadmarsh was greeted with unalloyed pleasure in the Post newsroom. So much so, that there was near despair when a fire broke out while they were ripping out the old tenant’s fittings.

But it’s open now and it’s a whopper. Two floors, 170 seats, and enough room to have a discreet meeting upstairs. The staff are finding their feet in a location which was bound to get hellishly busy at lunchtime, but there’s no need to worry for the thousands of workers around our base at Castle Wharf who are now within walking distance of a warm brew.

Personally, I don’t think the war’s over. I’ve yet to understand why my manor, a stretch where thousands of workers from the Revenue, Gala Coral, Castle Wharf and the courts rub shoulders with an immense bus and rail footfall, doesn’t deserve its own coffee shop.

But Costa is at least a start. For now, I can walk up and smell the coffee.

Just time for a coffee

Most of us are creatures of habit and I’m no different. When I’m out and about meeting people I’m looking for a place which is within 10-15 minutes walk, serves good coffee and is busy enough for some atmosphere but not so crowded that you can’t engage in discreet conversation.
The days of long lunches are history, which means you end up in a café or coffee shop of some sort.
I have my regulars and my views about them, and I’d be fascinated to hear what other people think/recommend.
Anyway, my coffee shop rundown:
Caffe Nero on Bridlesmith Gate – good service and a window seat means you can chat and watch the fashionable world go by. Dingy at the back, though.
Costa, Waterstones – service OK, the opaques stuck to the windows ruin what could be a great view. Better now it’s spread out, with a reading room vibe in parts. My greatest time-waster because you can linger amid the books afterwards.
Delilah – good food and coffee, but room limited and you’re stuffed if it’s busy
Café Contemporary – until recently, the only blemish on the Contemporary’s ground floor eatery was the fact that it is closed on Mondays, which is commercially silly. Otherwise, a hassle-free atmosphere in unique surroundings where it was easy to talk in your own space. Jury is out now, though: does the new franchisee understand its position as a particular kind of fashionable haunt?
Caffe Nero, Wheeler Gate – good service, roomier than the Bridlesmith Gate branch, room to breathe upstairs.
Starbucks, Sainsbury, Castle Marina - where I head when I'm working late. Except I can't now because they brought forward closing time from 7pm to 6pm. Aaagh*!?
Costa Coffee, Castle Wharf* – great addition to an already humming business location which daily attracts hundreds of visitors from the businesses in Castle Wharf, the courts, Castle Boulevard. Set to make a killing in the summer because of its canalside location. Overcomes the coffee shop desert which exists between Broadmarsh and the Station.
*OK, so I can dream, can’t I?