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Clones taking over our high streets
• MINI-supermarket branches like Sainsbury Local and Tesco Express are sprouting up in more and more “village” high streets.
Customers are lured away from small, established local shops by the belief that these new arrivals are cheaper – although I learn that their prices often exceed those in the supermarkets themselves.
The great majority of people use the big supermarkets for their lower prices as well as their huge range of products.
So it would be foolish to oppose them. But many people also appreciate the individuality and personal service of small shops closer to their homes.
They do not want them replaced by baby clones of the major supermarkets, whose huge profits enable them to acquire prime sites in high streets.
The limited finances of small shops can rarely withstand such powerful competition.
The invasion of mini-supermarkets thus threatens the survival of shops which provide character and variety to areas.
The passionate opposition to Islington Council’s sell-off of its commercial properties in Amwell Street shows that residents want their small, familiar shops to remain, even if their goods are somewhat more expensive.
They object to the increasing cloning of nationwide supermarkets which would deprive each area of its individuality.
Are not supermarket profits already big enough without further expansion which threatens to obliterate the pleasing variety of comparatively modest, financially weaker, but usually unique competitors – the small local shops?
ANGELA SINCLAIR
(Address supplied) |
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