Redruth: the Cornish town that lost its Woolies twice

Graham Soult

Retail consultant, writer, blogger; helping retailers via CannyInsights.com and CannySites.com. Say hello on Twitter at @soult!

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7 Responses

  1. Sarah Thomas says:

    Hi Graham. Big W was in Pool & at least 2 miles from Woolworths in Redruth town centre so I don’t really think you can say it was in Redruth. I remember the Woolies in Redruth town when I was a child but I think it may have gone by the early to mid eighties. Do you have any information on the large stores that were in West End Redruth. I know they used to have an amazing staircase.

  2. Graham Soult says:

    Thanks Lee! John Rogers emailed me last week to make exactly the same observation about Leicester. I should have remembered that example, given that I blogged about it myself at http://www.soultsretailview.co.uk/2010/11/02/one-bus-ticket-11-former-midlands-woolies/!

  3. lee dymond says:

    another location is Leicester, Woolworths first opened in Gallowtree Gate, Leicester in June 1915 and sold shortley after takeover by paternoster/kingfisher. They then re-opened in 1986 in the Hyamarket center (100thbirthday.co.uk) this store the closed in 2006/07
    http://www.shopping-centre.co.uk/news/fullstory.php/aid/1176/Woolies_bought_out_in_Leicester.html

  4. lee dymond says:

    From 100thbirthday.co.uk

    First opened in High Street, Lincoln (adjacent to the Stonebow) in February 1923 and progressively refurbished and extended as a flagship, tudor-boarded store. Kingfisher signed a deal to release the property, which closed on 22nd September 1989 and relocate into the nearby Shopping Centre, with limited story store no. 1154 opening on 25th September 1989 and closing on 21st September 1991. This is turn was replaced by store 1171, which was opened in the Waterside Shopping Centre by H. R. H. Princess Diana, Princess of Wales on 3rd October 1991. The Lincoln property was released for redevelopment in 2005.

  5. lee dymond says:

    Lincoln has had 2 woollies both of which closed before the collapse.
    The first was located where the entrance to the waterside shopping centre is, this closed down to make way for the shopping centre in which woolies took up a unit, this closed before the collapse and was replaced by primark.

  6. Lee Dymond says:

    Skegness Woolies which opened in 1929 appears to have taken existing premises as can be seen here
    http://skegnessvideo.com/2009/06/nostalgic-memories-of-skegness-shops/
    http://skegnessvideo.com/2009/01/page/6/

  1. September 21, 2011

    […] Woolworths stores in Cornwall that had disappeared long before the retailer’s 2008 collapse: Redruth (store #813), which seemingly closed in the 1980s and is now Superdrug; and Launceston (#812), […]

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