Repelling supermarket growth

We have a smallish Te$co in our town (which is a rural market town) - it sells mainly food so doesn't cause much of a threat to independant businesses in the town. We are lucky to have a very good hardware shop which has withstood the advent of a DIY chainstore on the outskirts of town (mainly because the people who run it are so helpful and have time to answer questions), three butchers, quite a few arty gift shops and the start of a trend towards shops which are 'different' - an apothecary, a shop selling 'spiritual' items, one which sells interesting reclaimed antiques etc. Te$co have just announced plans to build a much bigger shop on a site on the ring road - there is an exhibition next week which we are going to, to look at the plans. It seems to me that the town would lose out by having a larger supermarket which sells a wider range of items, such as electrical, kitchen equipment etc if our independant businesses go to the wall as a result.
Does anyone have experience of fighting such developments? Would appreciate advice. Will probably not resort to arson as protesters did in Bristol!

As much as I dislike supermarkets, they can't be blamed for any business closing. That can only be the fault of the buying public. If the community really care about the independant stores then the stores shouldn't have anything to worry about, but I'm guessing that most of the customers will claim to love the old stores but will come up with 101 reasons to shop at the supermarket instead.

The independant shops in our town have a policy of not duplicating what they sell (apart from staples) - the hardware shop for instance didn't sell supplies for cars until the small business that dealt in car spares closed down. I agree with what you say, Mark, in that it is the individual responsibility of people to make their own decisions, I just don't trust a company who have such cut throat policies and who want to have an influence in a small town which is for their own profits rather than the good of the community.

I posted last night about this, but it seems to have disappeared?

Ledbury already HAS a Te£co, a Co Op and several smaller supermarket type stores (Spar etc) as well as a small ish type shop at the petrol station AND a few corner type shops.

It also has several butcher shops, a bakery, a deli, wine shop, electrical goods store and a hardware store ( although the breadth of stuff on offer in Mr Rodways is not described by simply "Hardware" ) and individual shops of all sorts. It has hardly any "chain" shops at all.

It DOES have a Homebase out on the by pass and I guess the proposed site for Te£co would be somewhere there. Not very accessable to anyone except by car...

It really does not have a need for another supermarket AFAICS, the two we have are not heaving at the seams or anything and there are many other supermarkets available in nearby, bigger towns/cities.

Hereford (13 miles away, good transport links) now has 2 Te£co superstores ( 24 hour opening) plus 2 Te£co expresses, one of which is very nearly as large as the store in Ledbury AFAICS from driving by ( it used to be a very large pub!) Oh, AND a large Aldi, Lidl, Sainsbury superstore, Morrisons superstore, and at least four smallish Co Ops ( out in the 'burbs)


Malvern ( 13 miles in the other direction, good transport links) has a Waitrose, Morrisons, Somerfield, a large Co Op, several smaller ones and a Lidl

So we have a fair few to choose from!

Ledbury has a population of about 10, 000 people with a sparsely populated rural area around it.

I will be attending the exhibition. I WILL be quizzing the team.

I cannot, for the life of me, see how another store can be justified on planning grouds and I suspect I will be objecting to this proposal

I was assuming from what I've read that they would be closing/selling their other site in the town. One thing which annoys me about the plan is that the new proposed store becomes 'out-of-town' - OK, it's not a big town, but it would be reachable mainly by car. The current shop is a short walk from the town centre and has a bus stop so that pensioners who don't drive can reach it. I cycle there to pick up shopping - the by pass is very dangerous for cyclists so I probably wouldn't choose to do this.

Mmm just read a bit more about it - of course they will change the use of the "old" store site back to residential use...(ha ha)

of course no other retailer will step in to buy an existing premises already zoned for retail!

ooo look, there is a pig flying by my window...

'scuse my sarcasm....

Now that we have two major supermarket chains interested in expanding and multiplying in our town I have become conscious of their spread in other places. Mr D and I drove through Malvern today - we haven't been that way for a few weeks, and in that time a pub which had been empty for some time has now become a small Tesco. The interesting thing is that it has opened up 100 yards away from a One Stop, which is also owned by Tesco. Talk about saturating an area!!

mark barker wrote:As much as I dislike supermarkets, they can't be blamed for any business closing. That can only be the fault of the buying public. If the community really care about the independant stores then the stores shouldn't have anything to worry about, but I'm guessing that most of the customers will claim to love the old stores but will come up with 101 reasons to shop at the supermarket instead.

I kind of agree here, but some of the blame rests with owners of smaller stores not moving with the times. In the small town I live in, many of the shops used to be open 9-5 weekdays, and close early on Saturdays ! Unbelievable. That essentially means they were almost never open when anyone aside from the retired and the unemployed can get to them.

After a few attempts by supermarkets to get planning permission to move into (or onto the outskirts of) town which were fought off by the town council, word got around that the latest application was from Waitrose. The locals, even the local butcher, ran a petition supporting the application. It went ahead, and seems to work fine alongside the local shops, who benefit from the people drawn into town. They also seem to have woken up to the idea that Saturday afternoon is not a good time to be closed !

Completely agree - on July 4th, which was 'Independence Day - buy from your independent traders' my daughter (who works longer hours than me and has a half hour journey back from work) said that although she was in sympathy with the idea, practically speaking she couldn't participate because all the small shops were closed by the time she got home. There is a printers and stationers just around the corner from us where I buy bulk packets of envelopes, but I can only shop there in school holidays because of the strange opening hours which as you say cater for those who are at home all day. There has to be a move from the independent traders towards catering for the rest of us! I can't see why opening hours couldn't move by an hour one day a week, to open and close an hour later - if all the shops did it, it would work and become accepted. I think CW has suggested this to local shop owners but I got the impression that the response was lukewarm.
Interesting about the response to Waitrose near you, CH, and the fact that it's working well locally as an arrangement. I get the impression that Waitrose have more ethical values than some other supermarket chains.

I'm pretty well on par with the majority of the views here. I strongly support local commerce, as the revenues go into the local economy, via the owners, etc. as opposed to large investing houses in foreign countries **cough** China **cough chough**. Oh, pardon me.



While it's true that the Uber Mega Markets offer lower prices, it's at a cost. Ma and Pa must support themselves in the little market they run, and expect to do so in a fairly decent manner. The Super Chains often, not all, but often, pay a sub-livable wage. It's too frequently the case that if an employee only had thier own, single income, for a family, on what the shop pays rank and file laborers, they couldn't afford to do their shopping at same.



But this is all about a difference in philosophy. Ma and Pa are doing it for themselves. Mega Super Fantastico Mart is doing it all with the pocket books of the investor and this quarter's bottom line in mind.



I'll support Ma and Pa whenever possible. They're at least planning on living in this community for 30 more years, rather than leeching it dry and moving on.