The town of Boston in Lincolnshire is facing an epidemic of empty shops. More than a quarter of its retail spaces are vacant, and the situation looks set to worsen. A few lucky establishments, such as Café Noglish and designer store Coneys, are doing better than others, but the majority of the struggling town centre’s shops lay barren, many only propped up by signs offering them up for rental.
Lisa Fitzgerald, who manages the Pescod Square shopping centre in Boston, believes that unless something drastically changes in the next year or two, the town will face a far greater number of empty retail spaces. “We are dying from the inside out,” she says, “and if something doesn’t change, people will stop coming into town, and we will lose more and more shops.”
In a bid to save the ailing town centre, there has been talk of refocusing Boston’s identity onto leisure and heritage sectors, with the idea of becoming a “unique selling point.” While Anne Dorrian, leader of the council, is keen to highlight recent regeneration projects such as the Geoff Moulder Leisure Complex upgrade and a new adult learning centre, many retailers feel this focus overlooks retail’s importance as a cornerstone of the local economy.
Some local businesses, such as ST Hopper Ltd- one of the town’s longest-running operations- believe Boston needs free parking for at least an hour in order to draw custom in. Tim Hopper, owner of the jewellery store, ultimately sees the town as retail-driven: “We need shops that are worth coming to,” he says. “The Market Place should be for retail.”
The concerning trend in Boston, which has seen the likes of Marks & Spencer and HMV shuttered forever, highlights a broader nationwide problem in the wake of COVID-19. Many towns and cities across the UK are struggling to keep their high streets alive as shoppers continue to favour online retail experiences, leaving town-centre retailers to either adapt or wither away
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