Retail Recommendations: Can They Save the High Street?

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We’re all familiar with the Portas Pilots, the Town Teams and the controversial reality TV show whose resulting furore has overshadowed Mary Portas’s December 2011 report and its 28 mainly sensible and constructive recommendations.

Launched with less fanfare in early June was the government’s “Parades to be Proud of” packed with advice for occupiers of shopping parades, the less glamorous siblings of the high street. Some of the advice is commercial (“consider who is the anchor of the parade”) some good (“work collectively”) and some patronising (“go the extra mile on service”) but like the Portas report it shows the government is trying to help retailers in these hard times.

But will even the more practical and achievable recommendations in these reports make a difference when there are so many barriers to success or even survival?

One of the problems is the institutional lease. Although it is becoming more tenant friendly terms are still too long. Retailers need maximum flexibility with short, easy to renew terms and frequent, easy to operate, penalty free break clauses. Rent reviews are upwards only so rent will increase even if turnover goes down. Quarterly rental payments are standard and cause cash flow problems. Even where monthly payments are allowed many small retailers can’t afford prime spots.

Could rents be adjusted so smaller retailers pay less? Rents are set by the market and it cannot be fair on landlords to allow a smaller retailer to pay a lower rent per square foot than its multiple neighbour.

High street properties tend to be older and more expensive to maintain than shopping centres so service charges are high, planning permission for alterations is harder to obtain and the alterations themselves trickier to carry out. Local councils could help on the planning front (for changes of use as well as works) and also on business rates which are a crippling expense for small retailers but which (unlike rent) could be adjusted so that multiples pay more than independents.

Competition from shopping centres is tough. Car parking in town centres is expensive whereas out of town it is usually free. Convenience is also key as 21st century customers, juggling jobs and families, want to shop as quickly and easily as possible so they prefer big supermarkets and retail parks or they use the internet.

Ultimately it is the consumer who must be convinced to revive high streets and shopping parades by using them and because of that any recommendations, however good, can only go so far. Mary Portas may be the Queen of Shops but on the high street the customer is king.