White Stuff Northcote Road due to close - please help

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Annabel (admin)
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White Stuff Northcote Road due to close - please help

Postby Annabel (admin) » Mon May 25, 2020 12:26 pm

A petition has been launched asking the landlord of White Stuff on Northcote Road to help save the shop from closing after more than 20 years in the area.  http://chng.it/6ctBkNnMN6  The shop is due to close permanently as it has not been able to secure a reduction in rent to help it through the current crisis.  Without support from landlords many of our much-loved local shops and restaurants could soon disappear.  Retail was already suffering before the virus but now shops and restaurants have been closed for months and once they re-open their takings will be dramatically reduced due to social distancing measures.  We’ve already seen so many independent businesses disappear from Northcote Road and chains closing their doors too.  If the landlords (apparently only 2-3 own many of the shops on Northcote Road) can’t be persuaded to be flexible and help their tenants to survive this crisis, we will lose our few remaining independent shops and have many more  empty shopfronts, potentially changing the character of Northcote Road forever. 
 
Please sign the petition (it’s very quick and easy to do) and share it as widely as you can. You could also consider writing to our Northcote Ward councillors and the local MP:
Councillor Louise Calland: cllr.l.calland@wandsworth.gov.uk
Councillor Peter Dawson: Cllr.P.Dawson@wandsworth.gov.uk
Councillor Aled Richards-Jones: cllr.a.richards-jones@wandsworth.gov.uk
MP Marsha de Cordova: marsha.decordova.mp@parliament.uk  
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juliantenniscoach
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Re: White Stuff Northcote Road due to close - please help

Postby juliantenniscoach » Mon May 25, 2020 3:32 pm

Have signed.  I remember when they were in Webb's Road about 1992 I think.
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chorister
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Re: White Stuff Northcote Road due to close - please help

Postby chorister » Mon May 25, 2020 5:49 pm

According to the last accounts filed at Companies House White Stuff is an international company with a turnover of £148 million.  The highest paid director earned £422,000.  They've been losing money for 2 - 3 years and started cutting staff in mid 2019.  They may well be using COVID as an excuse to rationalise.
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gkc
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Re: White Stuff Northcote Road due to close - please help

Postby gkc » Mon May 25, 2020 9:40 pm

It may be true that White Stuff was already struggling (I have no idea, but wouldn’t be surprised given the challenges the high street has been facing), but this is about saving all the shops & restaurants on Northcote Road, not just White Stuff. The petition is an appeal to all the landlords on the road to work with their tenants to help them survive. Apparently just 2-3 landlords own many of the properties on the road.
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chorister
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Re: White Stuff Northcote Road due to close - please help

Postby chorister » Mon May 25, 2020 11:16 pm

gkc:  I get that, and I think there need to be compromises.  But (1) White Stuff is a bad example on which to make a stand and (2) we - all of us - are complicit in this.  I knew Andy who ran Northcote Music pretty well.  He told me a story of someone who came in to buy a keyboard for his daughter, took about 20 minutes of Andy's time discussing alternatives, made a choice, fiddled with his phone, showed it to Andy and asked "can you match this price".  When Andy said "no" he shrugged, said "well I've bought it" and walked out.

The moral is that if we want the high street to survive, then we all need to make sacrifices in terms of being willing to pay higher prices and often accept less convenience and less choice.  It's up to us, not the landlords.  White Stuff is reducing staff and closing stores not because of rents, but because for 2 - 3 years we have been buying less in its stores.
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Nutcaseuk
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Re: White Stuff Northcote Road due to close - please help

Postby Nutcaseuk » Tue May 26, 2020 10:12 am

White stuff is in a corporate mess, and they have deep pockets to keep open if they want !! As someone mentioned their accounts show a downturn due to economic environment !!
I used to buy a lot of clothes from WhiteStuff but their prices have gone up just that big too much that people will go online !!! This is the reality of the world we live in these days and it’s all very well waiving petitions in front of landlords, but shops need US to spend our money in them !!! Every item you buy online means a sale lost for YOUR high street !!!
So as shops open, let’s get our wallets out and
SPEND ON OUR HIGH STREET to support our local shops !!!
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Gillydoll
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Re: White Stuff Northcote Road due to close - please help

Postby Gillydoll » Tue May 26, 2020 2:32 pm

Yes White Stuff in Northcote Road was not doing so well before Covid 19 but the service was excellent , there are still some people want to try on clothes before they buy, they want to have a conversation and a social experience. The white stuff is a beautiful shop with hard working individuals. It fund raises for Trinity Hospice and has employed a number of local young people generating skills in those young people they wouldn’t get elsewhere.
What is the point of shops being empty because of landlords greed?
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