Shops still busy across West Midlands despite downpours and Covid Christmas
Shopkeepers and business owners in the region have been battling to make the most of the last-minute Christmas rush as a third lockdown looms.
However many say the tills have been far quieter than normal, at what would usually be the busiest time of year, with the coronavirus situation made worse by torrential downpours across the region.
Despite the weather, the Merry Hill shopping centre in Brierley Hill has been packed with cars this week and bosses at the Cornbow shopping centre in Halesowen say trade had been steady.
But George Demetriou, manager of Stafford Guildhall, said the prospect of another lockdown was bad news for traders.
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He said: “The news of a new lockdown isn’t good, but I know that most of our retailers have got core processes in place to deal with any disruption.
“Generally, we’ve been busy earlier on and have less people coming in the afternoon, but it’s definitely been busier on light of the news of a possible lockdown.
"We’re trying to limit the number of people that are having to wait for too long and most shops are doing their own queue maintenance.”
Yesterday it was confirmed that the Black Country, Staffordshire and Birmingham will all be staying in Tier 3 on Boxing Day, but that could soon change with infection rates rising and a second mutant strain discovered.
Eve O’Connor, manager of Cornbow shopping centre in Halesowen, said: “Since the removal of restrictions on non-essential retail, we’ve seen an increase in visitor numbers, with the shops welcoming a lot of people shopping locally.
“We were probably busier on Tuesday and the weather has played a large part in whether people will choose to venture out or not, but we’ve still had a good period as far as footfall goes.
“If lockdown occurs, 50 per cent of our square can still trade and we’ve found that our businesses can adapt to any situation, such as click and collect and online retail.”
Mike Tolley, whose shop TR Music has operated on Stafford Street in Walsall for nearly four decades, said: “It’s not been as busy as usual in terms of people coming in to look around and we’ve been doing more online sales.
“I think people are worried right now, certainly more worried than a week ago and I think we’re about 30 percent down on what we would normally do at this time of year.”
Meanwhile Kerry Goodyear, who runs Sorella Florist & Event Stylist in Hednesford, said the shop had been extremely busy.
She said: “We’ve had lots of people coming in after self-isolating to get Christmas presents and we’ve been delivering to people unable to go out of the house.
"We’ve actually had to turn people away due to stock running low and we’ve sold all the surplus stock we kept from earlier this year, so it’s been busy.
“Lockdown in January wouldn’t have a big impact on us as we find January is a very quiet month for us, but we’ll still be able to trade online and do click and collect if necessary.”
And Mark Hodgkiss, who runs Mode Menswear in Tettenhall in Wolverhampton, said it had been one of the weirdest times he had ever known in 20 years of retail.
He said: “We can have one day where it is really busy, then find it is very quiet the next, so there’s no consistency.
“Any lockdown will be a massive challenge for businesses like mine.
"We can still offer click and collect and offer free local delivery, so we can still offer a service.”
