Loughborough Winning the Battle to Woo Shoppers

LOUGHBOROUGH is punching above its weight in the country’s drive to attract shoppers into the High Street, says a new report.

An annual survey measuring the performance of town centres revealed Loughborough has more big-name stores, such as Wilkinson, Boots and Waterstone’s, than the national average.

The town also has 67 per cent of its stores selling clothing, household items, jewellery and medical goods compared to 60 per cent nationally.

Loughborough Town Centre is also better than the national average for selling convenience items such as food, cosmetics, flowers and medicines.

The Business Confidence Survey was produced following a benchmarking exercise which also showed that:

* Footfall counts in the town are busier than the national average

* More vacant units are now occupied which indicates a vital and viable town centre

* A higher number of short-stay car parks are available than the national average.

There is also more encouraging news about the retail state of the town from the report.

It showed a higher number of businesses had increased their turnover in the 12 months since January 2011 and they were expecting a further rise during the same period this year. There was also an above-average number of market traders with 80 compared to 23 nationally.

Shoppers were also interviewed for the report, “Market Town Benchmarking”, and offered positive responses when questioned about the physical appearance and cleanliness of the town as well as the variety of shops.

Councillor Paul Harley, Charnwood Borough Council’s Cabinet Member for Leisure and Culture, said: “The report offers more encouraging news about the retail picture in the town and the fact that Loughborough is performing better than the national average.

“It also reflects the outstanding contribution made by the authority’s Town Centre Management and now the foundations have been laid towards a top-class partnership with the Loughborough Business Improvement (BID) group.

“The report also recognises our market which I think is quite superb and it is also encouraging that we now have more vacant units occupied as that is an issue we have worked hard on in the past 12 months.”

Jonathan Hale, BID Project Manager, said the Market Town Benchmarking report shows that Loughborough is a “vibrant and popular” town.

He said: “The work done by BID since replacing the Loughborough Town Centre Partnership in February shows we are moving in the right direction.

“But we can’t become complacent and businesses have to continue to work closely together to meet the challenges which surely lie ahead.”