Tuesday 3 February 2009

East Belfast Retail Closures

The recession has begun to bite in east Belfast. At Connswater Shopping Centre, the shutters are down at Easons the stationers, Jayne Bentley the florist, Mr Pickwick's café, Woolworth's store... who is next? Barratt's shoe-shop is, presumably closing; there has even been ominous talk about the future of Dunnes store, which is the second-largest unit at the Centre after the anchor store, Tesco.

Ironically enough, Connswater Shopping Centre has only just completed a multi-million pound expansion at the main entrance, with a first-floor food court. Despite this recession - and no consolation for those whose jobs are lost - the long-term outlook must, surely, remain optimistic.

On Belmont Road I am told that Valentine the florists has closed down, too. How many more shop-keepers are on the brink of closure, I wonder?

8 comments :

grannymar said...

Food stores and undertakers are the only folk sure to keep going. People eat or die everyday, everything else is an accessory to living!

Why must I use Google/Blogger to comment instead of username & URL, like I do on other sites?

Timothy Belmont said...

Florists are finding very hard; bought flowers are considered a luxury and must be bottom of the shopping-list for those hardest hit by the recession.

I don't know about having to use Blogger/Google. Perhaps Google owns Blogger and wants to hog it all!

grannymar said...

There should be another option in your settings I think. Other Blogger blogs have it.

I am in a picky mood today!

Timothy Belmont said...

I've amended my settings to users with Google accounts. Let me know if that helps!

Tim

grannymar said...

Mine is a Wordpress Blog.

I don't use open ID.
I dislike signing in as a Blogger a/c.
There is another option where you can allow me to comment using my Username and URL.

Hope that helps.
Gm.

Timothy Belmont said...

Sorry You've had trouble commenting, Gm! I have amended the comments so that it is now as open as possible and even anonymous comments are accepted (for now, at any rate).
Hopefully this will prove helpful.

Tim

Anonymous said...

That's it!

Thanks for changing things around for me!

Anonymous said...

Just testing - commenting does seem simpler now.