Is your highstreet "dead"?

[Brad]

Cheltenham high street seems to be ok. Right mixture of Polish food shops, dodgy mobile phone accessories, cex and the like and then a massive John Lewis, cavendish house, Up market bakery, with a Wetherspoons opposite. It’s all over the place but something for everyone. A Game and an indie game shop too.

[Lebowski]

We had one of them Sainsburys local shops in the center of our small town that's just closed but it was a stupid place to put it as it was competing with a co-op an aldi a lidil and a M&S food store, Bar that we have quite a thriving high street, supermarkets charity shops, discount stores, opticians an independent phone shop, an independent record shop mixed in amongst the cafes, pubs bakerys ect. The market has a decent following on a weekend with a upmarket cheese guy and a pie guy, they also do beer and food festivals at certain points using the market square as well as the usual Christmas market.

[Wools]

...The market has a decent following on a weekend with a upmarket cheese guy and a pie guy, they also do beer and food festivals at certain points using the market square as well as the usual Christmas market.

Reading an upmarket cheese guy and a pie guy made me visualize you're living in an Animal Crossing type world, and 2 of your villagers are a walking Edam and a bumbling Key Lime type character.

I think I've had too strong a coffee this Friday morning.

[Cepp]

Manchester's fine.
Same for Bury.
Oldham's done for though. I went back for the first time in years recently and it was depressing. Outdoor market is more car park than market. Indoor market is about 30-40% full? Shopping centre is half empty. When Debenhams went under a B&M took its place.

[CMcK]

I live in a large town in Scotland's central belt called Falkirk. I know people are surprised it isn’t called Falkirk nil but that’s another story.
The high street is pretty much dead here having lost Woolies, M&S, Top Shop, Next and Game amongst others. It’s all mobile phone and charity shops now although Cex and Waterstones seem to do fine and we inexplicably have two hi-fi shops. Pubs are terrible these days although the amount of coffee shops is ridiculous.
Thing is this a reasonably well off area but I think the biggest issue for the area after online shopping is that this town and the surrounding area is commuter belt for people working in Glasgow and Edinburgh. If you are used to what the cities have to offer and already have a train pass you’ll go right back through for shopping, eating out, beers etc. Must admit I’m guilty of it myself.
I like what’s happened in Dundee’s high street which has plenty of cafes and bars so it’s very much focused on the social side of things.

[Colin]

As an independent shop owner, the state of the current high street in the town I'm based is a bit of a concern. A lot of the big names went under during the pandemic leaving units empty that no small indie could ever fill, so you have to wonder what's going to happen to them and the place could end up feeling dead. I'm lucky that I'm off the main shopping strip and that I'm more of a destination shop. We're not as reliant on foot traffic as people actively seek us out, same with out neighbours a couple of doors down that own a comic book shop. It's definitely been a rollercoaster couple of years due to the pandemic but I've come through it pretty much unscathed and with a lot of positives. I'm allowing for the next year to be pretty poor due to everyone tightening their purses with rising bills etc, but I'm fairly confident the shop will continue.