John E Altham

The Shopping Experience in Bishop's Stortford - Good or Bad?



Posted: Monday, March 01, 2010

by John E Altham
Activ Bishop's Stortford

It's all good! Shopping in Bishop's Stortford is certainly a pleasurable experience and comes highly recommended. With a wide range of retailers, coffee shops, bars and restaurants, the town is a great attraction for both residents and shoppers from the surrounding villages.

The main shopping centre is Jackson Square, which has recently been revamped, and now includes a new Sainsburys, plus several other high street names such as Next, Game, Thortons, Birthdays, Phones 4U, Bon Marche & Starbucks.

The main attraction for the locals is the traditional street market which is held on both a Thursday & a Saturday. Well known high street names are also present in the town such as Marks & Spencers, Burtons, Laura Ashley, Halfords & The Early Learning Centre. There are also a number of well established local businesses such as Pearsons Department store, Zelleys the jewellers and Clement Joscylene selling furniture and household goods.

Following the sad closing of the extremely popular and traditional general store, Woolworths, it has now been replaced with bargain store, QD. Selling a vast range of goods at great prices, the store has been well received and a tremendous success. Furthermore, a recent addition to the town is the opening of a Tesco Express in the old revamped premises in which Iceland previously traded and Mr Simms traditional sweet shop in the old Jennings Bookmaker shop, opposite Jackson Square.

With the current economic climate and some retail premises remaining empty, the town of Bishop's Stortford is bound to see many further changes over the next few years to its shopping profile. In the latest figures available presented by Town Centre Manager, showed that only 28 out of 307 retail units were empty in the town, equating to a figure of just 9%. Of those 28, only 16 were available as the other 12 were currently under offer.

Included in the report to the town council was an action plan, which included ways of attracting new retailers to Bishop's Stortford, one of which is to look in to the possibility of placing compulsory purchase orders on premises that have empty for more than 12 months. The old Sainsbury's site in South Street being a prime example of this as it is now over two years since their move to Jackson Square.

However, with the choice now on offer, Bishop's Stortford is certainly a great place to hit the shops.

To find more about the town of Bishop's Stortford, please visithttp://www.activstortford.com. To save money in Bishop's Stortford check out the discounts section http://www.activstortford.com/savemoney.

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