Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Aldi (or others) dont just suddenly decide to do that on a whim, so those plans must have been known about before she bought the house.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

No it is a recent application and has been approved,the land was supposed to be just for housing,but there are no shops nearby so i guess that's why it was approved,personally i think it's a good thing.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

My missus would be ecstatic. She's excited enough about a Lidl that's being built 3 miles away :shocked:

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Oh Tarquin you poor thing,have an avocado and a glass of bolly;)

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

You might find that some of the Aldi and Lidl produce is as good as Waitrose if not better.;)

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Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Mmm, see you could pay more tax, better the NHS than Otters Deli.. ;)

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Loved Rutland when I was posted there (2 x training courses @ RAF North Luffenham (near Edith Weston), with side jaunts to Bletchley Park) - Oakham and Stamford had some cracking pubs.

Got to visit it when I was a civvy in the 80s, as one of my brothers-in-law lived in Harringworth - the local pub had lovely pints of Pedigree and Ruddles County, and there were often "lock ins" for the locals (and their guests) as it was in the middle of nowhere, so unlikely that passing plod would interrupt.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

A lot of Aldi and Lidl produce is the same as Waitrose.

In that it's literally the same food with different stickers, from the same warehouses.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Indeed Waitrose just sell it at a premium price.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Shopping centre owner Intu expected to go into administration.

https://www.theguardian.com/business...administration

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Not sure it's that simple - they may be produced in the same factory, but often to different specifications.

Found this on another site

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

:Yes: Where I work, we make our own product, and also many supermarket branded products. The 'main' ingredient is the same, but other specs vary according to customer (supermarket) requirements.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Not quite the high street but a sign of the times when shopping malls are going broke as well.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

£4.5bn of debt was always going to bite them on the bum eventually. Malls have an advantage over the high street in that they have parking and are usually covered, so they’re still a day out even when the weather’s awful (not a small consideration for the likes of Braehead on a winter day in Glasgow). But some analysts are saying that the growth of online shopping, that would have affected even profitable malls perhaps 5 years from now, has accelerated due to Covid19.

Some of Intu’s portfolio is good and will survive - I can’t see any reason for the likes of Braehead, Trafford or Lakeside malls to be broken up for scrap. I don’t know enough about the others though.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Ah yes I was forgetting Watford - formerly known as the Harlequin Centre back when I lived in that neck of the woods. There’s a John Lewis in the Watford site and as you say, it’s attached to the high street. It’ll be fine.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Most seem pretty good sites to me https://www.intugroup.co.uk/en/our-centres/

There was a commentator on Radio 4 earlier - she made the point that indoor sites which were at a premium in the past to high street locations (think British weather) are reversed now, due to higher Covid-19 risks.

Based on the quality of the sites, I reckon the administrators won't have a problem shifting most of them, albeit at a hefty discount from what they were worth back in March. I can see longer-term investors like the Duke of Westminster's Grosvenor Estates being interested.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Not quite the High St., but I visited a well-know DIY store a couple of days ago. No queue to get in, but a 40 minute queue to get out! And near the checkouts were piles of stuff that people had dumped before walking out. It was at that point in the store that a small sign declared "card sales only".

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Practically everywhere is card only these days.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

I've still.got the same £50.cash in my wallet that I took out of a cashpoint in Feb. Will we ever use cash again ?

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

I did the same i've got £40 left.

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Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Can't get much in Waitrose for a tenner, Seph. :)

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Tip the parking attendant;)

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Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Ouch! :D

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

The Torygraph costs me nothing to view all content and I don't know why ! It's some cruel joke ;)

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

It lights one’s Cohiba quite adequately, donchaknow...

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Has Mrs K let on that she has a subscription to it? :D

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Upper Crust and Caffè Ritazza owner to cut 5,000 jobs.

https://www.theguardian.com/business...up-coronavirus

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Re: Changes on the High Street
 

You just need to know when to go and where. On the cheese counter they can only sell for 3 days after opening even if the cheese is fine so watch (or get a taste) and go back to get some good discounts.

Spent £40 cash to blacksmith to repair BBQ, although the signs all talk about contactless many farm stalls at the market still taking cash - no tasters though which is a big shame. Not too bad at farmer's market but you can't run a fromage stall without tasting. How do you know what new cheese is like and it's too expensive to but and throw.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Very sad.
Not good for SSP's peers either.
WH Smith thought they were escaping the woes of the high street by focusing on travel outlets. Into the furnace from the fire.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Sadly this is just the start l fear Andrew as in the last 2 day UK firms have slashed more than 12,000 jobs.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-53247787

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

More job cuts have just been annouced as Café Rouge and Bella Italia owner falls into administration.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-53270679

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

In some respects this is all good news.

We need to lose the concept of property as an asset to extract revenue from. Less high street outlets = oversupply of units and should push rents down for everyone else. In a best case scenario (if unlikely) of some being sold off to businesses who actually want to operate there. Extracting the financial sector parasite from the economy altogether.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

How would a business starting up, afford to buy the premises instead? Who pays for the property to be built and maintained? How would it work in a collection of units in a building?



Too much over-expansion in the cafe/restaurant sector. High risk at the best of times.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

I have about £60 in change and notes.

My local takeaway has always been cash only.

TBH I only use cash on items under £5 if I have change.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

I got some more out of the cash machine yesterday cos i'm going to Norfolk and they don't do technology that was invented after 1970.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

The properties already exist nomad.

How do people afford homes? Loans.

Same principles apply without the need for parasite landlords.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Not all properties are over a hundred years old. Many new shopping areas are built, especially alongside new housing developments.


What idiots are going to lend to a potential small business, especially ones of the type with a high failure rate. With homes, the funding for repayments is already in place, ie salaries.


Many businesses don't make enough to run with zero rent, so paying off a mortgage is just not going to happen.



Still leaves, who pays for the upkeep, especially common areas in a centre.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

The age is irrelevant.

Businesses get loans all the time, sometimes secured against assets - like land or premises.

If businesses aren’t viable then they go bust - that’s capitalism with or without parasite landlords.
Councils?

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Yes, Im sure all those people losing their jobs are just delighted. :dozey:

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

However a more sustainable high street would result in more employment opportunities and more stable employment for those in the sector.

Short term pain for long term gain.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

If Pret a Manger are struggling then that bodes ill for many other businesses on the High Street.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Parasite landlords? You really do have an attitude problem, jfman.

If it was as easy as you suggest for small businesses to own their own properties instead of renting, doesn't it make you wonder why they are not doing it?

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

It's not an attitude problem - it's reality.

It's extracting money from capital alone - it doesn't generate anything 'new' for the economy other than returns for the investors.

Of course it isn't easy for small businesses to own their own property - the price of said property is being driven up by the parasite landlords! It makes it more challenging, and less rewarding, for those great entrepreneurs you frequently tell us all about. Surely you, of all people on this forum, would think that's a bad thing?

---------- Post added at 20:28 ---------- Previous post was at 20:27 ----------

I'm not absolutist about it. :)

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

"Capital alone"?:confused: They're providing a building and a whole host of other services. Who pays for the car parking spaces? The "capital alone" really applies to lenders. If they didn't exist, then people couldn't start up businesses, buy their homes, buy their business locations, etc. How else do the shopping centres get built in the first place.:rolleyes:

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

You're using the narrow example of a new development shopping centre. Most High Streets aren't new developments, they are formed of existing properties that have stood for decades snapped up by speculative investors getting a higher return from rental than investing in shares.

A devaluation of property prices, and rental incomes, would be most welcome for the sector. That'd allow businesses (that employ local people) to flourish. A net positive.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

I remember back in the late80's early 90's being a market trader wishing for a shop in a smallish town. The only option was to take on an existing lease from a business that was closing. No problem until I found out I would be also responsible for any repairs on the building as well. Needless to say I didn't bother.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

So John Lewis will not reopen eight of its stores ... including the one in Watford. That's quite a surprise to me, though nationally I suspect their decision to shut down Birmingham permanently is the bigger shock. If John Lewis can't turn a profit in the UK's second city, what next?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-53348519

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

I think the issue with Birmingham may be the competition from Selfridges there. In some cities like Liverpool, John Lewis is the last department store remaining so can turn a profit.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

I suspect it's the other way round - Intu is more a symptom of John Lewis's (and other retailer') woes.
Competition from the internet, higher minimum wage, weaker £ to $ and increased business rates (in some regions) all conspired to make the John Lewis stores that closed unprofitable, even before the onset of Covid 19.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

I can see facemasks becoming more common in the coming months and years.


Much in the same way as some Asian countries, where it is common practice.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

The UK population don't have enough of a sense of responsibility. Wonder how the new shop/indoor facemask rules in Scotland and Belgium are going?

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

I'm glad I don't live in your 'reality', jfman.

So you are saying that if I own a building that I am renting out as a shop, some geezer can just take it off me because you say I am not contributing anything as 'it's just a property'.

That's not how it works in my reality, and I'm absolutely certain that I live in the real world. You come out with the craziest things.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Where did I say someone could just take it off you? All I’m saying if you’re making income from capital and not work, being a super-entrepreneur, or some other measure that’s a net gain to GDP.

Essentially extracting money from those who do provide a benefit. Like a parasite.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

So where is all the money that is lent out in personal loans, business loans, mortgages, and indeed government borrowing supposed to come from?:rolleyes: How else can pension funds operate? The businesses wouldn't be able to get started in the first place.


Even Cuba has had to allow capitalist businesses.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Mortgages are created out of thin air. They simply open a debit balance, secured against the asset, and charge you interest as you pay it back.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

:D Actual real money is handed over to the seller of the property. Where does that come from?
Link


Link

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Do you think there are savings deposits to cover all borrowing? Or course there isn’t. It’s frankly naive to think so.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

LOL.

(I really hope you dont actually believe that).

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

It's the multiplier effect which is how banks work. £1 in deposits for every £10 lent. Hence the need to bail out the banks in the Global Financial Crisis.

A good move here - the top floors of an upmarket shopping centre in Liverpool are bieng converted to a campus for a music college, co-owned by Robbie Williams.
https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news...music-18594969

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

:confused: A building society such as Northern Rock, may have lent out money, but then they SOLD that mortgage. The buying company now owns the debt, as if they were the ones that issued the mortgage in the first place, and NR has money to lend out. In essence they were acting more as a self-appointed and self-serving mortgage broker. The first mortgage won't be on NR's accounts. From their point of view, the mortgage debt has been paid. You can only count the bank(etc)s current outstanding loans, not all the past ones added up together. The money for the 2nd mortgage has come from the buyer of the 1st. In turn the buyer has had to raise the money from somewhere. That will have come from investors or loans.



With no "parasites" prepared to buy NRs mortgages, NR was stuck. The banks weren't bailed out, it was the banking system that was. Confidence for depositors had to be propped up. Without the money from the depositors, loans of various sorts, couldn't happen.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

It’s much closer to that than the notion the bank holds savings which it lends out.

The days of a George Bailey down the Buildings and Loans went out in the 70s.

---------- Post added at 22:27 ---------- Previous post was at 22:23 ----------

It’s almost like a system designed by parasites for parasites. Leaving the state to carry the can when the house of cards comes tumbling down.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

This is why banking is so heavily regulated otherwise banks could keep on lending until the cows came home. Hence deposits v loans ratios etc and why Royal Bank of Scotland was bailed out and Woolworths wasn't.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

I think I'm on my third broker since getting my initial mortgage with Northern Rock . . . couldn't tell you the name of them without looking at the letters . . couldn't even tell you the names of the previous either :rolleyes:

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Or were the "parasites" the ones that took out mortgages they couldn't afford to pay back, in the expectation of making easy money from house price increases when selling the house. It was people not paying back the loans that was behind the crash.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Definitely not those who gave mortgages to people who didn’t have the earnings or capital to repay them - you’d think they had a "duty of care" or something...

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

NRs problem wasn't deposit-loan ratio. When they sold on the loan, it was not that different to the mortgagee repaying the loan, because they sold the house or took out a mortgage elsewhere. That mortgage was no longer on their books. If a loan has been repaid, it no longer figures in any deposit-loan ratio.

---------- Post added at 22:55 ---------- Previous post was at 22:52 ----------

People lie about their outgoings, and the capital was the property, especially with houses prices increasing. In the US, mortgage brokers were falsifying documents in order to "earn" commission.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

A false economy - asset prices would have rose for wherever they planned to move to.

However your opinion is clear - it’s alright for the rich to walk away leaving the state hold the can but people trying to buy their own homes are parasites.

Despicable, quite frankly.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

I worked for a UK sub-prime lender (2003-2007, approx. £3 billion market cap) as Head of Technology, then for a year as IT Programme Manager for Barclays Capital - your interpretation is not congruent with actuality.

tl:dr - the companies that were supposed to provide oversight and manage risk didn’t in the chase for profits and bonuses.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Another use for high streets
https://www.ft.com/content/9d585476-...0-9755806e261a

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

They have a place in our City now where they replaced a leisure centre , trouble is many of the units in there are still up for sale now.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Middlesbrough Council have bought a shopping centre and a nice old building. They're looking at using some of the space for flats and turning the area into a little leasuire park.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Pizza Express £1.1bn in debt. :confused:

https://www.theguardian.com/business...king-1000-jobs

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

And they can’t blame Covid, they plunged to that figure by December 2018. That’s absolutely shocking. :Yikes:

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

l was quite surprised they carried so much debt as some debt in itself is not a problem if a company can service its debt comfortably but it seems their problems go back quite a bit..

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Debt in itself is not a problem but it’s hard to see how they ever thought they could service a pile that big. There have been some dreadful decisions made in that company.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

It shows how capitalism has become more about finance than the bread and butter of economics.

Den, you or I couldn’t get £1.1bn into debt selling pizza. We’d, individually or collectively, get laughed out of town.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

My younger brother worked for a company called Palmer and Harvey for quite a few years who repeatedly said they were in decent shape financially but of course they were convenient with the truth and it went tits up 3 years ago.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palmer_and_Harvey

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Looks like they spent the noughties buying up businesses with other people’s money then couldn’t pay the bank back.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Not business savvy myself but it seems it was a business collapse just waiting to happen.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Same end result as Carillion winning contracts it couldn't fulfill

Business eh, a risky venture if you push too far ;)

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

With other people’s money. ;)

Not so risky.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Just a leveraged buy-out whereby the purchaser puts up 10% of the cost of buying the existing shareholders out and the banks 90%. The cost of the debt ensures no corporation tax is due as the business is loss-making on paper.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Yup ... so the ‘owner’ of the business has become the owner almost entirely with someone else’s money, which sounds fine on paper because that’s what a mortgage is, however the level of debt racked up there was clearly unsustainable. A leveraged buyout is still supposed to leave a business able to trade, unless there’s a deliberate underhand plan in play for the directors to milk it dry and then collapse it. Not saying that happened here but it has been known to occur in similar scenarios.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

And not forgetting, if it's a US company doing the LBO (even of a UK company), there's a huge tax benefit.

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

Looks to me like the ones who can't see a scam are the banks . . . again

Re: Changes on the High Street
 

The question is how much have the banks learnt from the 2008 financial crisis? as l am not qualified to answer that question personally but l am sure someone more qualified will.