alt Hacker News'It's just vape, nail, charity shops': Can anything save UK high street?
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Commercial property on our high streets is owned, in the main, by foreign investment firms that treat it as an asset.
In many cases you can’t find out who the owner is. There’s too many shell companies involved.
These firms don’t care about occupancy, they care about the resale book value.
Business tax rates are based on those property valuations.
There’s no chance the property companies will reduce the value of their portfolio to reduce burden for tenants they don’t care about.
Then you have foreign online retailers like Amazon and Temu able to use complex multinational tax avoidance schemes and fake products to undercut the high street.
How can you compete if Amazon can deliver a knock off from China, that you can’t legally sell, faster than you can stock a real one into the shop, and at half the price?
Mentions the druggies in passing twice (once in a quote) and an astronomical crime level (160 per 1000 people? So I have a 16% chance of being a victim??) but zero mention of either at the end of the article in terms of fixing the issue.
Zero info on who the government hundreds of millions is going towards to help the problem (let me guess: a bunch of nonprofits who won't solve the problem).
I remember watching a video of retail tycoon Mike Ashley at a UK Parliament Select Committee hearing:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wn3p7by5F0I
A lot of what he said about the root causes of why UK high streets were dying seems to have been accurate, and this is before the double whammy of the Covid pandemic and the increase in interest rates to tackle inflation (as well as the mini-budget crisis of 2022), plus energy prices for shops and pubs in the UK are really high.
Retail parks are so popular in the UK because being able to visit a couple of stores in the park and do your shopping in one hit, plus the cheap/free parking, and that is ultimately what UK shoppers want - convenience.
If councils want to rescue their high streets, they may have to get more creative when it comes to getting new stores to open, beyond just offering a respite on business rates.
There have been a number of suggestions in various threads that some high street shops are money laundering; for what it's worth, London Centric investigated and found that the likely crime was tax evasion, not money laundering: https://www.londoncentric.media/p/asf-aziz-london-candy-shop....
Last month I visited the Scottish Borders and generally found this to be true, especially in Hawick, Galashiels, Kelso. I wasn't shocked however as I find the situation in Canada to be very similar (in the UK switch cannabis dispensaries for chippies). 25 years ago when a Wal-Mart came to the small town I grew up in, only took a couple of years to gut the high street, certainly Amazon threw fuel on that fire.
UK high streets have been in some kind of decline (IMO) for decades now. Long before online shopping, COVID and its repercussions, and the current wave of street crime (phones, watches) and front businesses (vape and phone repair shops hiring dozens of "skilled" workers on visas... to work in a tiny cupboard unit with implausible turnover). Even when a new "luxury" apartment block is constructed, the retail units often remain vacant for years before being occupied by a constantly changing list of tenants, none of which seem to be able to make a success of it. The nursery becomes a dojo, which becomes a social enterprise cafe, which eventually becomes an estate agent, which then closes.
Rents are high, parking difficult, the products undifferentiated (carbon copy list of the same 15-20 chain franchises), not unique. After all of that, I'll assume prices are no better and may be worse than online retail.
I'm not sure what the answer is, as retail is not my area of expertise. However I think that if there is a solution it will have something to do with people, community, and offering a specifically local experience. Not one which is purely a chore, and I think it will involve much more than just "convenience".
Free parking, turn the centre into a relaxing space/park, with kids' playground.
Add coffee shops and restaurants nearby, help promote casual entertainment venues like mini golf, community theatre, and weekend markets.
Grow from there based on the type of demand that appears, keep business rates low for the area.
They say it can't be done, but when that last shop closes right now there will be no choice.
To combat the dereliction and anti social behaviour they would have to rebuild anyway, and it will cost them more later than gradual repurpose/ investment.
To add to the headline I would say hairdressers/barbers and bad takeaways could also be added to the list.
What shops would you suggest could be added? Most people are buying larger items and clothes online or in chain retail park stores.
My small town has multiples of all of these but also many nice cafes/bars/restaurants and a butchers, bakers, a small market and fruit and veg, a couple of diy/hobby shops as well as 3 supermarkets, a library etc. There are even a couple of clothes stores and some pound shop type places.
I can't really see much of a change coming here or how it could be much better. Our 2 nearest city centres have a bit more variety but of course are mainly chain stores. People go out for an experience rather than shopping and this had already started well before covid hit.
EDIT: Interesting they chose Rotherham as an example, of course if they'd chosen Harrogate, Oxford, Durham, Bath etc the story would have been quite a bit different...
The end of the article raises a point that makes me wonder: that perhaps cities have put the cart before the horse and that people didn't go to the city center but, rather, that the city center was the place where people hung out. And with third-places in life support people have no reason to go to the city center anymore.
It’s not uncommon to see the car debate come up in threads like these. As someone who lived in central London for over a decade without a car and recently moved out where not having a car is incredibly inconvenient, I’ve experienced both realities.
Only yesterday, I drove into London and walked nearly 20k steps to visit the various locations on my itinerary. Not every inch of a space need be a road, but banning cars and insisting everyone walk or use public transport also isn’t the answer. We need roads adjacent to large, pedestrianised areas.
The specific problem with the UK is how London-centric and unreliable our transport infrastructure has become. Not to mention driving can be incredibly fun! Much more so than cycling when it’s pouring with rain, you’re going to a fancy event, or have a large amount to move.
I always wondered about the nail / foot spa stores. What is it about these businesses that makes them such good defaults when nothing else seems to be able to survive?
In the US, someone involved in some kind of money laundering task force explained to me that a lot of those short lived stores are used to launder money and other money related operations. Lots of barbershops for example had the only same 5 people all day long talking smoking and occasionally getting cuts yet the store was making as much revenue as a high frequentation store...
Remove the cars. Remove the parking. Make space for people and not cars.
Is there any discussion on the role of “welfare benefits” on this?
Unfortunately it's a trend that is expanding worldwide, but who wants to visit a city that offers the same of any other city? It's like plastic copies of the same product over and over again. Like an Andy Warhol piece.
A lot of those companies are tax dodges or money laundering. They are the only ones that can afford to pay the landlords and the mad council rates.
Councils trying to extract as money as possible from shoppers via parking companies doesn't help either.
What, have the gambling shops fallen to their online rivals? They were really dominating last I visited, which is admittedly some 8-10 years ago.
But yeah, UK main streets have a problem.
Most of UK is surprisingly poor so of course there are no nice shops. Duh!
quick anecdote:
I'm a Frenchman but I hold no particular dumb grudge against the English, I actually like them, their style, their music, what I perceive as their refinement as much as their capacity to be hilarious, quick with the banter, overall good lads
so a few years ago, I booked a trip to London, then a train to Northampton cause I wanted to see the city where all the good shoe manufacturers are based (I own a pair of Crockett and Jones and enjoy other brands like Cheaney, Trickers, etc).
what a BRUTAL wake up call, what was on paper a thriving manufacturing town with rich history turned out to be a completely derelict place, with boarded windows in the main streets, beggars, dollar shops, litter absolutely everywhere and the signs that the golden age of the town is LONG gone. I don't know what happened there, recession, Brexit, I really don't know but I ended up taking the train back to London earlier than anticipated, completely shocked by what I saw
I wish cities would treat high streets as public commons, rather than particularly valuable private real estate. Landlords are just looking to make the most rent possible and don't particularly care whether their tenants have positive utility for the community or not. Similarly, landlords have no problem keeping store fronts empty because they are holding out for a high paying tenant and have certain tax advantages.
I live in a little community outside Boulder, and we have a nice little main street area, only a few blocks, which is a good size for our community. There's a few restaurants, a cafe, a community space, some boutiques, all of which encourage foot traffic and liveliness. But recently, a little book shop devoted to kids books was forced out due to increased rent demands, and an architecture firm moved in. What was previously drawing maybe 100+ people a day to the main street now attracts 5 employees who work in a closed office. Not the end of the world for the main street, but if a few more shops make a similar decision it will be completely dead.
UK's high streets really are depressing.
More than half of the shops are retail chains with stupidly bright colors that clash with the local architecture. The other half is cheap-looking stores and bad restaurants.
To illustrate my point, I picked a random town center on google maps:
https://www.google.com/maps/@52.5494903,0.0881482,5a,55.8y,2...
This has a costa coffee, a subway, a ladbroke, a betfred, a bright vape shop, a haart real estate agency, a bunch of hair salons, etc.
To be fair, this town has also a number of local shops that look decent. But overall the aesthetics of it is highly depressing to me.
Look at the triovet clinic, this is a local place that wants to look like a national chain.
Our country has been sold off and scammed off. You don't understand the level of anger brewing. It's the same story across Europe and America.
People don't understand the scams but they smell it. They know how they remember things and they know that everything is getting worse not better.
I dare our governments to try and draft us into another war, literally dare them, even a war to defend our actual land - people have nothing to fight for and will turn their weapons on perceived perpetrators. It's brewing. This slow decline is painfully visible to people.
With 13% vacancy rate it's most certainly just very marginal businesses that stayed, so rents must be dirt cheap by now. Anything over 10-12% signals oversupply and it's a race to the bottom for landlords. Whatever it is, landlords are not to blame.
People just don't want to walk around places when they can drive and buy everything in one place.
"They do it because they can", this is the best explanation in so many cases, this not the exception.
My favorite Bankster(retired), has single handedly turned the main st in a small town here in Nova Scotia around, there were others holding on, and some trying, but her very accute targeting of interests and providing those services as loss leaders has drawn people back, and all the store fronts are occupied, and the vape shop is at the end of the strip. The activity is high enough that some of the older established business interests were forced to leave there just out of town tax havens and grab a spot down town,while the grabbing was good.
Isn't it like that everywhere? And I suspect the recipe is pretty much the same:
Local business owners are taxed to death.
Meanwhile, multinationals with HQs in tax havens roll in and set up national branches. The local branches pay their HQs for imaginary "services" and "rights", allowing them to operate practically tax-free in the country.
Good luck staying open little guy. We're lucky we still have vape shops and nail parlours.
Those shops are money laundering vehicles. Meaning: they are subsidized by cash from illegal activities and without that they'd be unprofitable as well, leaving high streets empty.
Its the parking. It's always been about the parking.
If I go to my local high streets I either cannot park at all (all residents only permits or disabled or taxis only or bus stops etc) or I have to pay eye watering fees - e.g. £1 or 2 per 15 minutes. Council parking wardens will be out prowling looking for infractions and giving you a £80 fine without any grace period.
...Or I just go to a shopping center like Brent Cross and park for free with zero hassle.
Yes I can walk or take the bus to the high street, but that will turn a quick 20 minute errands I to a 100-120 minute roundtrip, with the discomfort of doing it with shopping bags on the return journey (and the buss will cost you more than parking and fuel, while being slower, less convenient, and less pleasant)
For what it is worth, I don't feel like crime or drugs are a concern, at least not in my part of London.
In the US, city and town centers were first hit hard mid-20th century by the Interstate Highway System which enabled suburban sprawl and big-box retailers. Later came e-commerce. When something does take the place of a local shop or restaurant, it often ends up being a chain of some kind. Add the post-pandemic shift to hybrid work and you also see a huge increase of office space vacancies.
There's also the fact that property developers, commercial landlords, and institutional lenders frequently favor corporate tenants over independent operators. Rising property values and high commercial rents also price out local, independent owners.
However, there have been some exceptions under the New Urbanism banner where you see localized revivals. Some cities (like Jersey City) cap chain occupancy of retail space to 30%. Portland and Austin use zoning rules to make commercial real estate unattractive to chains. Commercial community land trusts can also be used to freeze rent and make space more affordable for local businesses. I doubt there's a one-size-fits-all approach.
"just stop your crying, it's a sign of the times" Harry Styles
That city is notorious
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotherham_child_sexual_exploit...
What on earth is "charity shopping"?! I see it a lot on social media and dating apps.
Charity shops are great, actually. I wish more countries had them as commonly as the UK does.
High streets in the UK are pretty dreadful. One saving grace is the proliferation of excellent kebab shops. Affordable, delicious and fast (not that kind) food. I wish we had more options like that in the US.
> Mercer says a part of town filled with ethnic minority shops and restaurants has been disparaged by some as “a foreign bazaar”. “Would they prefer the shops were empty? It’s much better to have busy shops, but people don’t like change.”
No, it's that I don't like the council and central government turning a blind eye to obvious crime fronts because they're desperate for the tax. Don't call me a bigot or xenophobe.
I would prefer them to be knocked down for housing frankly, as many town centres are close to useful train stations. The council can then use the council tax
Councils are supporting the don't build any housing any where mandate. It is such an obvious use of the land it's crazy. We still have to delusionally play along with ideas about how to "regenerate the high street".
Case in point. Huddersfield is currently "regenerating" its town borrowing huge sums for a new library and new markets etc instead of just flattening the town and replacing it with housing. The railway line is also having a major upgrade. The timing is literally perfect. Another own goal. But hey a lot of employment was generated and I'm sure the mandate to employ local didn't mean a lot of backhanders....
People will move to a shithole if it has good transport links to jobs, which Huddersfield has. Look at Romford for example. The council has sold off loads of land for flats and is selling more. All because of the new Elizabeth Line
Guess what the result is when 10,000s people with good jobs move in to an area? Demand for shops and services!
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I find nicotine vaping really pleasurable. It's all about finding the right device and flavor though. I'm rocking the XROS Pro 2 right now but I also have a box mod with a mesh coil that I sometimes use as well. I'm not against vape shops as long as they aren't selling disposables.
Thats funny how journalists ignore elphant in the room; UK non-domicile (non-dom) tax regime was officially abolished on April 6, 2025.
So a lot of high-earners would now have to pay UK taxes on worldwide income. So they left the country or only stay there mininal amount of days to not be considered resident.
Many high street businesses were working for these people with tons of disposable income.
Also criminal situation was little better when these high-profile people were roaming London streets. No one wanted something happen to them.
It comes down to money and the cost of living. Landlords are extracting rent, no room for entrepreneurship.
A race to the bottom, but I wouldn’t blame Amazon. Large multinational chains were hollowing out high streets and making them less pleasant before online shopping.
As another comment said, councils and government should treat high streets more like public commons, prioritising independent businesses and making places distinctive.
What frustrates me is that even prosperous areas with new developments rarely make space for small businesses. Instead, we get “private equity” chain.
Ugh, one I saw recently was Bristol University’s new campus by Temple Meads. The wall between the campus and station could have been lined with small, affordable units for independent and student-run businesses. Would love to browse a few interesting shops or grab a decent sandwich before catching a late train. 23m for a new entrance but where are the opportunities. (This is based off the media announcements, not walked through there yet)