Andy From Sligo wrote: » may be wrong but i thought i read/heard somewhere they were there rent free for a while should be able to get to rest of quayside now without walking through Next shop which was always silly i thought
Ms. Chanandler Bong wrote: » Homebase don’t sell kitchenware anymore. Next have been in trouble in Sligo for a while. That’s why they restructured the layout to put the kids stuff in the biggest section - it’s their biggest seller in Sligo. They had disagreements with centre management over opening hours at Christmas almost every year, with Next wanting to close at say 1or 2pm and the centre saying they had to open because of the Quay street side. As far as I’m aware, TK Maxx were looking to move to Carraroe but the shopping centre management offered them a great deal to stay put. Not sure how it’ll pan out if the centre is emptying faster than an Olympic sprinter out of the blocks!
sligono1 wrote: » Who actually owns the Quayside? I had herd before an American vulture fund bought it or the debt off the bank
Capone79 wrote: » DV8 should move into Next, that’s if EJ AND HIS CRONIES won’t object. They’re the problem, plus greedy landlords. The CC are complaining about people shopping across the border in Enniskillen but who have they got resurfacing Ashlane??? Contractors from Enniskillen. Pot, kettle!
sligoblue wrote: » Have to say, I'm very impressed with EJ, he kept going through a recession and is now doing very well due to clever advertising and internet sales. There is an article about him in today's Times, do you know he employs 27 people in his shop? Chains like Next, Aware (not the local guys) River Island will come and go depending on profit, a local guy stuck it out and is doing well, but you begrudge him it. In regard to the infrastructure works, if local companies want the jobs, then they have to be more competitive.
Capone79 wrote: » Don’t give me that crap.He stuck it out because no other shop is allowed to sell the likes of Superdry etc. I’m all for competition, which means lower prices for the paying public. No one should have a monopoly on anything in such a small town.
Buford T Justice wrote: » Really, So what does the superdry shop in Johnstons Court sell then? Or TK Maxx?
Capone79 wrote: » The second hand shop, TK Maxx? All I’m saying is some other decent clothes outlet like DV8 needs to move into Next. EJ is complete robbery if you ask me.
Buford T Justice wrote: » And all i'm saying is that you're spouting waffle that's factually incorrect. TKMaxx isn't a second hand shop. I abhor paying high prices for clothes, but EJ's are no more expensive than any place of its kind. They just happen to have a lot of brands under the same roof.
Capone79 wrote: » Ok, name me another shop that has a lot of top brands under the same roof? And don’t say TK MAXX. You can get a quality pair of jeans in Topman NI for £25/30. EJ sells pairs anywhere from €90-€144. If Topman moved into Next. I would def spend my hard earned money in there, knowing I’m getting value for money.
Capone79 wrote: » Ok, name me another shop that has a lot of top brands under the same roof? And don’t say TK MAXX.
Capone79 wrote: » You can get a quality pair of jeans in Topman NI for £25/30. EJ sells pairs anywhere from €90-€144. If Topman moved into Next. I would def spend my hard earned money in there, knowing I’m getting value for money.
sligoblue wrote: » I could be wrong, but don't topman sell own brand jeans and clothes?, I didn't think they sold super dry. Penny's and Dunne's sell good value jeans, if you want brands like superdry, you usually have to pay more than an own brand like Topman, Penny's or Dunne's. Next, River Island, Aware have all been to Sligo and offer clothes at less than EJ, they left (possibly only a matter of time for RI) but EJ is still there with his higher price clothes, so obviously he is doing something right. You sound pretty bitter about EJs, he seems to do a roaring trade for teenagers and boys in their early 20's, these would hardly be a group with loads of money.
Buford T Justice wrote: » Good for you. I choose to buy my stuff in pennys if I'm of a mood for some new kit, but I don't bemoan the success of a local business.
Capone79 wrote: » Topman and the other two you mentioned are nowhere near the same quality and fit of clothes. I gave Superdry as one example, there’s plenty more. Next and Aware left cause of greedy landlords, which forced them to increase prices.I’m not bitter at all, just would like some more competition. If he’s doing such a roaring trade why would he have to gallop down the street on a horse waving a sword about like a ejit. If you’re good enough, your product sells itself.
Capone79 wrote: » Well that’s great, I suppose a dogooder such as yourself is happy with the state of the Retail Park at Carraroe.
mano79 wrote: » Thats really is the problem with Sligo summed up up in one sentence. We never are happy to see a success story in our town. There is always one jealous begrudger Edited to say talking about your EJs comment. Your spot on about the CC just beggars belief
Shelpy wrote: » Buford T Justice wrote: "And no, the retail park is a joke, but that's been stifled by the chamber of commerce and is a whole different subject" A whole different subject you clearly know nothing about. There is some amount of idiotic comment made on this topic in this and other online fora by people who don't have the first clue what they are talking about. The Chamber of Commerce does not and has never made the rules about what can and cannot be sold in different areas of the town. That is solely the preserve of the elected public officials of the town. If you don't like it, vote different officials into office - the public is responsible for what officials they elect to local government, not the Chamber of Commerce. Apart from such a fundamental ignorance as mistaking who is responsible for making retail planning rules in the town, a separate issue is if you think it's a good idea to allow unrestricted retail planning? If so, you are arguing for putting the final nail in the coffin of the centre of a town already experiencing significant challenges. Unrestricted retail planning would ensure Sligo town centre becomes a totally dead ghost town of decay with far higher retail vacancy than already exists. Furthermore it would guarantee no chance of the centre block of the town (surrounding Tesco carpark) ever undergoing the already long overdue regeneration the town so badly needs. If retail planning is unrestricted the costs to develop or rent retail space on greenfield site outside town would be vastly lower than the respective costs for the badly needed brownfield redevelopment in the town centre. This is planning 101, and there is a huge weight of professional planning opinion produced over the past three decades throughout Ireland and the UK on how lax retail planning has contributed to the destruction of town centres, communities and the fabric of society, with particular impact on the most vulnerable in society. This is not rocket science or crystal ball gazing, lax retail planning has already been tried (along with lax residential development zoning) all over the UK and Ireland and the terrible results documented many times over. Planning might have a bad name but in the vast majority of cases that is not because the professional planning opinion was bad - it is because elected officials either ignored or didn't give enough weight to it when making decisions. While Sligo faces many challenges already, thankfully it has not suffered as badly as many other places due to this specific issue of lax out of town retail planning and with the continued maintenance of good planning practice (not a given, in the future local politicians could easily be elected who choose to ignore planning best practice) we have a better chance of the town centre being regenerated (it requires commercial investment which the people of the town or public authorities can't force to happen, but can create the right planning framework to make more likely) for the benefit of all. Once that is done, if there is then still commerical appetite for relaxation of retail or other development outside the town centre then, and only then, should the people of Sligo via our elected officials grant private capital/commerical interests that privilege.
Andy From Sligo wrote: » OK - well looks am going to try and drag up some old posts and information on when I think COC blocked ARGOS from coming to town for years because they wanted to set up in cararoe retail park and COC kept lodging complaints with An Bord Pleanála saying that they wanted them to open up in the Town centre instead - and i'm almost sure they enforced the Sligo environ plan as well to dictate what could and not be sold up at the cararoe retail park ... they certainly didnt help try and get that plan overturned anyway ... just interested in their members right in the town centre itself I felt its been and feck every other retail business that wanted to operate a little out of the town centre. - a Chamber of Commerce should be for all retail sectors in town not just a select few in the centre of town. - Regardles of who came up and kept enforcing the plans throughout the years and objected to businesses starting up just out of town centre and what can be sold or not sold at Carraroe well done - every other satellite towns around Sligo have welcomed new businesses into their towns wherever they wanted to go ... and whoever is responsible has suffocated Sligo and thats why its top of the league for empty retail units everywhere in the town (and retail park)
Shelpy wrote: » You haven't got a _clue_ what you are talking about and have said several things which are demonstrably false ("every other town has welcomed new businesses into their towns wherever they wanted to go") Andy. I can show you reams and reams of planning decisions from towns elsewhere in County Sligo, the north-west of Ireland generally, or any place or region you so choose in Ireland or the UK which proves your statement false. Regarding the retail park the Chamber of Commerce in Sligo (among others), simply asked for the rules as explicitly laid down by the public authorities (who represent the people) to be enforced when those rules were flagrantly breached by business seeking to flout public rules (made on behalf of the people) to increase their own private profit. If you don't like those public rules, then it is entirely within the right and only within the ability of the public authorities to alter those rules. Not only an Board Pleanala but also The High Court made this abundantly clear in relation to the retail park issue in Sligo. These are both organs of the state, representing the people. Sligo Retail Park operates under parent planning permission granted by Sligo County Council on 1st August, 2003, for a retail warehouse park incorporating 12 units, and containing a DIY store and garden centre, leisure unit and fast food restaurant. The initial planning permission for Unit 5 was for leisure use, but by order of 26th October, 2004, the parent permission was altered to substitute the use for Unit 5 as a retail warehouse and which permitted an increase in the mezzanine floor area of the unit. That planning permission, which issued on appeal by the Board, contained condition 18 which provides as follows:- “The retail element of the proposed development shall be restricted to retail warehousing development only. In this regard, the range of goods to be sold in the retail units shall be restricted to bulky household goods and goods generally sold in bulk (as defined in Annexe 1 of the Retail Planning Guidelines for Planning Authorities issued by the Department of the Environment and Local Government in December 2000), including carpets and floor coverings, furniture, electrical goods, computers and DIY items, including garden equipment.” Condition 18 in the relevant planning permission identified the range of goods permitted to be sold in Unit 5 as “bulky household goods and goods generally sold in bulk”. How one is to understand the goods of this type is specifically referable to the definition in Annexe 1 of the Retail Planning Guidelines issued in December 2000. The definitions in those Guidelines are of note:- “Retail Warehouse – A large single store specialising in the sale of bulky household goods such as carpets, furniture and electrical goods, and bulky DIY items, catering mainly for car-borne customers and often in out of centre locations.Bulky goods – goods generally sold from retail warehouses where DIY goods or goods such as flat pack furniture are of such a size that they would normally be taken away by car and not being manageable by customers travelling by foot, cycle or bus or that large floor areas would be required to display them e.g. furniture in rooms sets, or not large individually but part of a collective purchase which would be bulky e.g. wallpaper, paint.” As an internet commentator without a clue what they are talking about (we are not short of such people!) you are free of course to not spend your time talking absolute nonsense on internet forums and instead go and get a degree in retail planning to educate yourself about the reasons for public planning policy. If that seems too much of a challenge, then maybe at the next election you could go out and put up posters for some offspring of the gombeen politicians we had in the past in Ireland who favour ignoring planning best practice - then you don't have to bother to understand planning which is an entire professional discipline in itself - you can just elect somebody who will ignore it without even attempting to understand it!
Andy From Sligo wrote: » nnow i think that the way sligo town centre is laid out with its tiny streets and bad access for delivery vehicles and parking dotted all over the place I think all you can do apart from flattening the whole of Sligo Town centre and starting from scratch is to build outwards and use the use of out of town retail parks and lift this stupid environ plan
peasant wrote: » or ... ...you could make the huge car parking area at the retail park into a park & ride facility and have buses going from there into/through town and back on a constant loop. But that would be creative and might actually work...so why bother:D
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