Shrewsbury: the town where independents are keeping the high street buzzing
Regular readers will know that I visit a lot of British high streets – including more than 400 different ones in the last four years...
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Fifties postcard confirms location of original Alnwick Woolworths
Back in April I blogged about the apparent location of Alnwick’s original Woolworths, where the chain traded for the first fifteen years of its 55-year...
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Hexham store closures create space opportunities for new retailers
While Hexham’s soon-to-close Millets looks to have a new tenant waiting in the wings, a couple of other closures since my previous visit in June provide...
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Coffee shop lined up as Hexham Millets confirms 21 September closing date?
Hexham’s Millets store in Fore Street is to close on 21 September, after trading in the town for seven years. Though the Hexham Courant broke...
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The discount retailers dominating Suffolk’s ex-Woolworths sites
Alongside its new-look Clintons, the Suffolk town of Stowmarket seems to have come off fairly well from recent retail administrations. Earlier this year, its ex-Woolworths managed...
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Woolaballoo.com and Deli at Number 4: Hexham’s new breed of web-savvy independents
I’ve often commented on Hexham’s very low retail vacancy rate, and the fact that the town’s empty units rarely stay empty for long. Arrivals in...
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Cirencester’s ex-Woolworths: a window on the rise of discounters
I often talk about how the fate of ex-Woolworths stores provides a fascinating ‘window’ on the changing high street, and the ex-Woolies in Cirencester (store #394) –...
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Woolies spotting in Somerset: a cinema, a bank, a hardware store and a fashion discounter
With a visit to Taunton on the schedule for later this month, it seems an appropriate time to write about the Somerset ex-Woolworths stores that I’ve already...
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Historic Alnwick’s original Woolworths – and a modern-day successor in Wilkinson
In the same way as Houghton-le-Spring’s Woolworths was originally in a different location to where it ended up, I recently discovered that Alnwick, too, has...
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Celebrating Britain’s indie department stores: Atkinsons, Banburys and Barkers
Among all the retail gloom that the newspapers seem to like writing about, it was refreshing to read last week that Browns of York is to...
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On the hunt for ex-Woolies – and thriving high streets – in the Scottish Borders
With a visit to Edinburgh imminent – which will no doubt involve at least one or two Woolies-spotting detours – I figured it was time...
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Hexham Poundland opens; Ashington to follow
Poundland opened the doors of its new Hexham store last Thursday (17 November) – and I understand that another Northumberland Poundland will be opening in Ashington...
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Poundland to take over Heron Foods site in Hexham
One of the few empty shops in Hexham will soon be occupied again, with Poundland set to move into the former Heron Foods site in Priestpopple....
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Ledbury’s ‘son of Woolies’ – and a visual identity inspired by the past
Dorchester’s famous Wellworths may have had to change its name to Wellchester at Shop Direct’s behest, but a store in the Herefordshire town of Ledbury...
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Peacocks and Poundland get ready to open in Hitchin’s former Woolworths
Earlier in the week I mentioned how the former Woolworths in Newquay had been divided up between Poundland and Peacocks. Now the same process is...
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Redruth: the Cornish town that lost its Woolies twice
In my last post I mentioned my February visit to Cornwall, writing about one of the county’s former Woolworths – in Launceston (store #812) –...
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5-7 Southgate Street, Launceston – historic birthplace and former Woolworths [updated]
The hazard of doing so much travelling around interesting towns is that I end up with more retail-related photographs – and topics to blog about...
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New Mountain Warehouse reaffirms Hexham’s status as a retail hotspot
Visiting Hexham on New Year’s Day, I was interested to see that a new branch of Mountain Warehouse had sprung up since I was previously...
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Can anyone remember Ashbourne’s long-closed Woolworths?
While the 807 stores that closed down following Woolworths’ 2008 collapse are well documented and relatively easy to find on the ground, tracking down stores that...
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Familiar discount names in Staffordshire’s former Woolies stores
The more former Woolworths stores I blog about, the more predictable it gets that I’ll be mentioning now-familiar discount names such as B&M Bargains, Home...
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