By Colin Lever
WALK through the Christmas market and you can almost touch the atmosphere being created under canvas.
The ambience, the sense of a community coming together is palpable. The produce, the people, the personalities are local. You can touch the merchandise, feel the quality, taste the alcohol, savour the sausages and smell the aromas. Live music from local musicians fills the air. Even the Christmas trees that grace the tables are locally grown. Yes, there is more to community wealth building than mere economics.
Three-quarters of the Island’s retail businesses are small or medium-size enterprises. They are the backbone of a society, employing around 7,000 people, who pay taxes and return much of their hard-earned income back into the Island.
Retail accounts for around 7.6% of GVA, greater than that contributed by hospitality (4.5% ) and farming (<1%). Roughly half of all GST is generated by the retail sector. Yet, outside the festive Christmas fair, SMEs are, largely, cast to the margins.
Of the 400 and more outlets, St Helier has most of the right ingredients but not necessarily in the right places. Charity shops are popular, yet they are also marginalised. Bringing all these in from the cold is essential. Maybe the town-centre shops are too spread out. However, exorbitant rents stand in their way. One SME’s rent is 60% of its outlay. That’s not sustainable. Vibrant Jersey’s website contains a cornucopia of SMEs and it is these artisans that St Helier needs more of.
There is nothing more certain than change and, for sure, the shopping experience in town is changing.
Strolling up King Street, you get the sense that the place is slowly becoming gentrified. Rental prices in the south of the town are far higher than those further north, feeding the exclusivity. Even the jewel in the town’s crown, the Central Market, is now less of a market and more of a meeting place, with so many eateries having taken the place of traditional greengrocers and butchers etc.
With less disposable income around, and with a cost-of-living crisis biting, it is no wonder there is little in town to attract the majority. An online thumbnail survey revealed that almost 70% of Islanders now rarely shop in town.
Stroll up Queen Street and there is little to whet the appetite of those in search of retail therapy. Colomberie, Hill Street and Beresford Street are in a sad state. The number of empty shops is around 13%, and most of these vacant units are in the north of the town, ttheir presence an indicator of a growing malaise. A town centre is so named not just because of its geography but also because it is the heart (and soul?) of a community, or it should be. Can we say that of St Helier at the moment?
Economists tell us that investment in infrastructure drives growth but in the absence of a strategic plan for revitalising the town centre, attracting more custom need not cost the earth. In 2020, post-Covid, Mary Portas, the famous high-street guru, said: “Don’t save the high street; change it completely.” (The Guardian, Dec 2020). But where do we begin?
Nordhavn in Denmark is dubbed a “five-minute city” because almost everything is a short stroll away. Cars are banned. Crucially, the council owns the land, so it decides what shops go where. It has created a vibrant, urban environment, which includes “concept” houses, multi-purpose units with cafés below and artisan boutiques above. They even have a shop where everything is free.
Across Europe, what brings many locals into town is a weekly market. On such days, traffic is redirected and parking fees are suspended. We can see the drawing power of the occasional craft fair and farmers’ market, organised by the government-funded Genuine Jersey and facilitated by the parish. So why not set aside one day a week for such an event? Straddle canvas stalls along the outside of the Central Market and along the esoteric French Lane. Add in a little Eine Kleine Nachtmusik and we would have our very own Covent Garden.
The ambience of King Street is compromised by a main road that cuts across it. The Central Market is hemmed in on two sides by traffic, poisoning pedestrians as they pass. When Oxford Street in London was finally pedestrianised, footfall increased by 32%. Maybe squaring the circle by pedestrianising the area around the Central Market, linking up with King Street and Halkett Street, would help. But this would require serious investment.
Experts say that our retailers must offer what shopping online cannot if they are to compete. Bespoke products and competitive pricing. In our UK franchises, food prices are around 12% higher than on the UK mainland. UK retailers claim back the VAT before adding on GST, a mark-up of around 15%. Most of that profit goes away from the Island. Could there be wriggle room here? Dynamic pricing is used to get the best deal for retailers. Why not use this to make sure their prices compete with those online?
Ultimately, all this is window dressing because it is the landlords and not the parish, nor the government, that decide what shops we get and where they are placed. But just how committed are these landowners to community wealth building? Where do they invest their capital? We see the occasional “pop-up” shop but it would be efficacious for landlords to offer flexible rental deals and/or let out units to multiple artisans. And for those landlords who are happy to leave their property vacant? The plight of Les Quennevais shopping precinct is a cautionary tale that St Helier must heed.
Visiting town should be a sensory experience, a visual extravaganza of the floral and the arts. There should be aromas of freshly baked bread and exotic spices, tastes of the delicatessen, craft ales and artisan crafts, cultural sounds of local musicians permeating the pathways. Community wealth building – wake up and smell the coffee.
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Colin Lever is a retired teacher and education specialist, SEND consultant and commentator on educational and community issues. He also contributes musically to repair cafés and charity events and is currently writing and producing a comedy sitcom podcast.
