10/10/2024
Yay, Another vibrant, exciting day out on Withington highstreet ☹
So, this is the situation. And let’s not beat about the bush here. Withington, well, it never was that pleasant, not to look at anyway, let’s be honest, but it certainly had a lot going for it. But did I ever expect it to become this bad?
This is an impossible place to run a sustainable business. And quite frankly a thankless task at times.
When we set up seven (7) years ago this high street wasn’t the best, but it was alright, stuff going on, but watching it’s year on year decline into what it is right now is startling. A lot of people who know me wonder why I’m so bloody miserable half the time and I try and point out that, to be fair to myself, if you had to see what I see almost every single day of your life then you may understand. It’s draining, demoralising and very difficult to get enthusiastic about on a daily basis.
As I said, this high street was poor enough when we set up shop, but not that bad, at least it used to have a butchers, card and gift shop, hardware and key cutting shops, a daytime bar, a daytime pub, fish and chip shop, convenience shops, numerous estate agent offices which were fully staffed and biggest of all it had three high street banks open and operational. It even had a Greggs!
All these things add to the High street economy and appeal. We used to have a takeaway trade of people on their lunch break, or grabbing a coffee before work. Now there is seldom reason to come out onto the High street unless you are directly going to one individual business. Almost zero ‘passing’ trade. On a High Street! Our customers come directly to us. As do customers of other businesses probably just visit them and no one else.
Now business is business. That’s always the threat, things change, you have to keep up with the times. That’s fine. The pace of change and what you have to do to survive and change and keep up over the last few years has been very, very tough. But it’s harsh business reality.
There’s a much bigger issue here. I’ve known from the very beginning it’s a night-time economy in Withington, which we’ll now certainly have to entertain. But we’ve always liked the daytime economy and things used to be fine just doing that, not very profitable, stressful and hard work but just about fine. There were people out and about, things going on, a nice place, cool people, a bit of city buzz and life and sole, people working, going from place to place doing stuff locally.
Just look at the state the Highstreet is in now. I went out on Monday morning at 9.30am. There were 38 closed businesses with shutters down at that time and only 21 open (to be fair some usually open in the day from mid morning). Numerous closed down, some just open in the evening and most of them just pretty much the same thing on loop every two to three shops (as those kinds of business are all that is sustainable here and other places right now). And the town on the whole would have looked a lot worse if there hadn’t been numerous volunteers working all weekend little picking.
Most normal areas would have a maintained car park, where people can park short term, two hours max maybe, then use all the shops, banks, library, maybe get a coffee, lunch, whatever. But no, we have a huge car park that has no access to the high street and is a prominent place for fly tipping and crime. It has numerous abandoned vehicles as we speak, there was even a guy living in his van in the car park for about six months last year (which is again a separate issue).
We have two ex banks that are not only closed but look derelict. The owners of these buildings should not be able to let these premises be left to look like that when they are not tenanted or occupied. These are in prominent high street locations and now we have a third closed ex bank, after Almost Famous, a large successful food business was unable to make their business model work here in this town.
Regarding us as a business we’re kind of alright, although trying to manage historic debt when the world went very wrong is a big issue (which is for another time), we are unbelievably busy over the weekend, to busy to cope, absolutely brilliant trade, vibrant, fast paced, fantastic, but to then go from that to this ghost town of a high street in the mornings during the week means it is incredibly difficult to maintain. We serve fresh food, need capable and trained full time staff, so to go from boom to bust in 24 hours is tricky, it’s possible but very hard to maintain. It’s just stressful to manage staff, stock and overall levels of quality and consistency. Not many sit down food led places have been able to survive in Withington as you can see from what has closed in recent years. And not to mention getting through the three summer months a year when there’s pretty much no one here (but again, that is not the point here).
Right now ‘business’ isn’t my main issue (as hard as it is). I live here, I have a house here, two children who go to a local school here and this isn’t an acceptable place to live, certainly for them. Business is business, but standards of living, whoever you are, have become totally unacceptable in this town, they have been for years.
I have very little reason to take my kids out in Withington, whether that is to eat, shop, go to a park, whatever. We mostly either stay at home or go elsewhere, somewhere more pleasant, less likely to get stabbed.
Over the years there had been some signs of improvement, but then that has all gone and we’re now left with this. And if I hear another word about the bloody ‘Withington regeneration scheme’ I’ll go mad. It’s simply to late now. The 10+ years (and well before that) of decline that could potentially have been managed are now beyond being able to be reversed. And other constant bits about oh, Withington, leading the way for urban communities and high streets to follow. Well, take a look for yourself and make your own mind up.
Additionally, the drain the Christie hospital complex is putting on the town as a whole doesn’t help anything or anyone. It should be a positive thing for the town having the Christie, such an outstanding, leading cancer care hospital right here, but they are draining every last resource Withington has and are offering nothing in the way of giving anything back to the quality of life here and certainly not to the local economy, quite the opposite. I remember how busy that area was years ago by the hospital and the amount of custom we got from patients, families and staff during the week. Now barely a sole to be seen.
I don’t have the energy to look to do anything about this (and as I’ve pointed out I suggest it’s to late to do anything about), and what the hell could I do anyway, stand on a soap box in the rain and shout about it? People with more intelligence and motivation than myself have failed. Even if I did know what to do, unfortunately what should be a fairly simple task of running a café has, in the last few years become such a monumental and stressful challenge that just staying open takes every single effort and minute of time I have. I've nothing left to give.
Don't get me wrong, none of this is having a go at any of the businesses here, there are some awesome ones, and they're trying their absolute hardest to make things work, then there's some that aren't for me and that's cool, that's why cities can be great, something for every walk of life. Different strokes for different folks, all good. The diversity on offer is great, it’s what used to give Withington it’s charm, all walks of life getting about their business right next door to each other.
There are also some great people who have worked tirelessly and tried to make a difference with all sorts of stuff locally. And i take my hat off to them, as trying to make a difference around here is like trying to keep the mines open for business, hard, dirty, unpaid and eventually fruitless work.
The death of the high street, not just here, but across the country is happening, or has happened. It started years ago with retail not being able to support the running costs of opening shops, now that is spreading across almost everything and allowing big business, certainly banks, but even estate agents, building societies, solicitors, services, whatever, to have no high street presence anymore is simply not acceptable for all sort of reasons. The breakdown of society is one of those.
Anyway. My point has been made (I’m not even sure what my point is and no doubt i will get streams of abuse for simply calling a spade a spade), just got to get on with it for now I guess, it is what it is as they say.
Maybe I’ll sit outside the café and have another look at the high street, see if it can be improved. Oh, that’s right, I forgot, I can’t. Until I somehow find the time to completely re apply (not re new) for our incredibly complicated pavement license that expired (that looks like it needs the employment of an architect), we’re not allowed tables and chairs out the front.
Maybe I’ll just sit on the floor then, I’m sure that’ll cheer me right up (or I could just go to Didsbury)…
