Age is just a number. This line is usually trotted out by divorced men of a certain age by way of excusing their decision to date a 23-year-old. But these days it could just as easily apply to Britain’s beleaguered veteran high street chains – because, as it turns out, having a long and illustrious heritage that can be traced back hundreds of years means precisely nothing in the cutthroat world of modern shopping. Age really is just a number when it comes to retailers failing in the 21st century.
First came Woolworths (RIP). Although originally American, the brand was embraced by Brits after it crossed the pond in 1909, as familiar a staple in suburban shopping centres up and down the country as any of its homegrown peers. Woolies is where I used my birthday money to buy my first ever album on cassette; it’s where I would splurge pocket money reserves on eye-wateringly expensive pick’n’mix, whose astronomical price only became apparent once it was weighed at the till (by which point it was too late to back out). Life without Woolworths was unthinkable and yet, in the blink of an eye, it was all too real. A hundred years after the first UK shop opened in Liverpool, all 807 branches closed up for good in 2009 following the financial crash.
