Dearly departed shops :-(

Dearly departed shops :-(

Author
Discussion

williamp

19,271 posts

274 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
birdcage said:
Ricemans Canterbury Kent, massive toy department.
I met the original Darth Vader there sometime in the early 80s. Dressed as Darth

Our price
Athena for the posters (and the girls who used to hang around in there)


bobbo89

5,232 posts

146 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
When did Free-spirit close down? Used to spend ages in there when I was a kid!

Bebee

4,680 posts

226 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
Quhet said:
Rosscow said:
Tandy
'nice action'

anonymous-user

55 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
Hildreths in Maidenhead was a great toyshop, back in the good old days..

northwest monkey

6,370 posts

190 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
Just remembered another one - Howarths in Sale Moor. Cycle shop downstairs (a proper old-style one) and a toy shop upstairs. Loved it as a kid & when I was a bit older and into mountain bikes. Probably gone now.

ETA - just checked Google Earth & it's definitely gone. It's either a bookies, a discount shop or a charity shop now.frown

Steve vRS

4,851 posts

242 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
SidJames said:
International Stores
Gateway
Comet
Bejam
Netto
Netto are opening a brand new shop in Lymm, much to the annoyance of the locals who expected a Booths or a Waitrose.

With regards to dearly missed toy shops, Mark Taylor's and The Beehive in Whitehaven hold many happy memories from the 70's and 80's.

Steve

legless

1,695 posts

141 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
Lewis's department store.

The one in Stoke on Trent used to have the most incredible Santa's grotto at Christmas time. I seem to recall it taking up most of a entire floor. No Christmas was complete without a visit.

Then it was bought by Debenhams in the late 90s and they transformed it from a proper department store to a glorified (mostly women's) clothes shop. Sad times.

p4cks

6,925 posts

200 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
The town was never the same once this place had left King Street...



ETA: These are now opposite although one of them has sadly closed down much to the disappointment of the tracksuit wearing mothers of 5 year olds being pushed around in their pushchairs, chins and chests covered in sausage roll pastry.


Edited by p4cks on Tuesday 10th November 20:52

condor

8,837 posts

249 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
I miss Unwins wine merchants ( went bust Dec 2005). I had a great time working for them.

Tootles the Taxi

495 posts

188 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
The Clydesdale in Tait Street Carlisle. A proper toy shop that sold toys, Britains models, Hornby, Wrenn, Trix etc as well as records & cassettes (remember them) which were displayed in a revolving rack that had to be unlocked to allow purchase of the cassette. It was a treat to be taken in there by my dad when I was a small boy to choose a Britains (Herald if it was a short wages week) cowboy or indian figure each week so I could re-stage the Battle of Little Big Horn or the Massacre at Wounded Knee on the landing upstairs with my little bro. Gradually moved onto model railways then records then tapes for my Walkman. If you were a serious model railway purchaser, you were taken into the other part of the shop that wasn't normally open to general browsers.

Blimey, that's getting on for 45-50 years ago.

Its now a cafe and Eastern European food store.

SydneyBridge

8,651 posts

159 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
seeing the pics of greggs above has made me think of proper bakers, cannot remember names but greggs have ousted them all. 3 in my town centre and 2 subways

Morningside

24,111 posts

230 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
In Lowestoft there used to be an electronics "junk" shop that had all sorts of odd 'n' sods. Spent many happy hours in there picking up some strange PCB of some totally defunct 1970s computer to take home and fiddle with.


northwest monkey

6,370 posts

190 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
What's quite sad is people on here are from all over the place & we can all name shops - some local independents, some larger chains - that have all been replaced with identikit type shops.

25 years ago, we could have all recognised our own local High St by the shops we had - Fields the Bakers, Cooper Sports, Howarths Cycles. These days, every High St has a Greggs, a Sports Direct or a Halfords. Is there any difference in Altrincham or Aldershot, or even any reason to travel from one to another?

freakybacon

551 posts

164 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
Hillards. Much missed Yorkshire supermarket chain swallowed up by Tesco. I remember the "Hillards not for sale" campaign as they bravely tried to fight off the evil Tesco empire back about 1979. Tesco said there would be no job losses. As soon as they had their way, first task was to get rid of duplicated office staff, which made business sense but did a great deal of damage to the local community. To this day, there are people who refuse to shop at Tesco because of this!

neenaw

1,212 posts

190 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
Tootles the Taxi said:
The Clydesdale in Tait Street Carlisle. A proper toy shop that sold toys, Britains models, Hornby, Wrenn, Trix etc as well as records & cassettes (remember them) which were displayed in a revolving rack that had to be unlocked to allow purchase of the cassette. It was a treat to be taken in there by my dad when I was a small boy to choose a Britains (Herald if it was a short wages week) cowboy or indian figure each week so I could re-stage the Battle of Little Big Horn or the Massacre at Wounded Knee on the landing upstairs with my little bro. Gradually moved onto model railways then records then tapes for my Walkman. If you were a serious model railway purchaser, you were taken into the other part of the shop that wasn't normally open to general browsers.

Blimey, that's getting on for 45-50 years ago.

Its now a cafe and Eastern European food store.
I vaguely remember going in there with my Mum or my Auntie to look at the Lego when I was a kid. It used to be a treat if I'd behaved myself when I'd been out in the town with them and I'd behaved myself.
It didn't happen that often laugh

Jimmy Recard

17,540 posts

180 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
thismonkeyhere said:
+ Saisho. Dixons' own, I believe. Had a few 'personal stereos' from Saisho back in the day, as well as a 'music centre' thing - turntable, twin cassette, radio, seperate speakers etc.
There's no interest here in Matsui?

miniman

25,021 posts

263 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
p4cks said:
I'm not ashamed to admit that a grotty sausage roll from Greggs hits the spot on occasion, but really, how can they possibly need 2 shops with only one other place between them?

swindler

254 posts

180 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
Boogie Box in Ripon. My friend used to swap the price labels round to buy Alice Cooper records for 25p.

Before that, Zodiac toy shop in Leeds. There was an entrance tunnel for kids. I wanted that electric Ferrari in the window so much it hurt. I think it was £11,000???

RichB

51,649 posts

285 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
Perik Omo said:
Gamages in Holborn, London. Used to have a fantastic xmas display with a massive model railway.
used to love being taken there by my mum, was a real treat to go to their toy dept and see the railway.

Moonhawk

10,730 posts

220 months

Tuesday 10th November 2015
quotequote all
Lo-Cost (My first real job - barring a paper round)

Cordon-Bleu (The Iceland of it's day - owned by the same parent company as Lo-Cost I believe)

Toy and Hobby

Zodiac Toys