Yes, I hit the shops over the last few days, doing my bit to keep the UK economy from falling into a dark pit of recession.
I was also looking to see if the credit crunch curtailed had spending. Overall, things looked really bad. Judging by the lack of serious shopping and heavy pre-sales discounts, I anticipate a large number of high street chains to fail after the new year.
Harrods
Yes, I did go the grocer shop in Knightsbridge, and the only thing I bought was an overpriced cup of coffee.
I don't understand Harrods; it seems more of a tourist attraction than a retail enterprise. There were few signs of deep discounts. Nor was there much evidence of serious shopping.
Westfield Centre - White City
The newest shopping centre in London is a scary place. I couldn't help thinking about all those poor hapless investors that stumped up the money to finance this white elephant. The place has the feel of a massive financial disaster.
It was eight quid just to park and I just don't think that people are going to pay that kind of cash every time they go shopping. How will the Marks and Sparks food hall survive?
As for discounts, there were plenty. Again, few signs of overloaded spend-happy shoppers.
Brent Cross
I was there yesterday afternoon. True, there were plenty of people milling around. However, it was the bags, or the lack of bags that gave the game away. At 4pm on the last Saturday before Christmas, a scandalous number of people were walking around empty handed.
Again, there were lots of discounts, but few people seemed interested.
Woolworths - Harrow
Woolies is the future of retail; half empty shelfs, busted boxes containing soiled goods and sullen staff playing out their last days at work before redundancy. The shoppers were a miserable lot and generally seemed disappointed that Woolworths wasn't giving away their stock for free.
It was a grim sight.
Still, there is more to Christmas than shopping.
6 comments:
£8 to park at Westfield? Are they nuts?
You must have been at Westfield for a few hours alice.
BHS was like a morgue this morning looks like they know its over already.the only shop I saw that was busy was the Pound shop it was heaving,oh and Iceland the checkout queues were huge.
I was in Harrods, when I recently visited London. Yes, it was just an attraction for me, I bought box of tea (with big golden letters "Harrods" on the box, of course :)) And I was pretty surprised how rude the staff was there. But it was full (October...)
Regards,
Lorne
Was on Oxford Street on Saturday. Was like 28 Days Later until noon. Busiest day of the year, they told me in the morning papers.
The shops can still afford to be grossly overheated, though. Very mysterious chappy, Capitalism.
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