Covid-19: Are independent shops bouncing back at Christmas?

However, compared to 2020, in which Berkshire was placed under tier four lockdown under a week before the big day, at least businesses can open their doors and trade as ‘normal’.

‘But Is It Art’, a local business first opened in Reading in 1973, used the lockdown wisely, but are still reeling from the impacts of shutting down.

Owner of the diverse gift store in Queen Victoria Street, Jackie Redrup, believes they are still below levels of previous years.

Above: But is it Art entrance

Speaking from behind the counter of the shop she has owned for almost 50 years, she said:

“We did a complete refurb as you don’t often get that chance as a shop to close down.

“We’d be working through the night doing different displays, so it was nice to not have the panic of having to open the shop.

 “We made the most of it!

“We do have an online presence, so we used lockdown to make that more interesting and we did quite well through delivering things locally. 

“The footfall is still low, we have quite a few in the workplace but most aren’t so we are still really down on years before.

“We’re still paying rent and haven’t paid rent back from when we closed.

“Annual takings are down on pre-Covid from when times were rough anyway, so that is difficult.”

Despite the challenges coronavirus has thrown up, Redrup implores that the pandemic is not the main issue behind declining revenue.

“Look at our shop, it looks like a building site- half the shops are empty on this street.

“This is not even lockdown; this is the ongoing high-street decline.

“Lots of people come in here and because we look busy, they think we are doing well but we’re not.

“Our rents and rates are absolutely huge for a small business.

“It’s not the big shops [impacting on us] it’s Amazon and online.

“We can’t compete with bricks and mortar and all the bills, even if we are very nimble.”

From one side of the coin to another, Union Street’s Eclectic Games are thriving post-lockdown.

Owner of the award-winning game shop, Becky Ottery, said that sales boomed over the enforced shut-down, but there are still challenges ahead.

“We have generally got back to what we would expect from the numbers back in 2019, which is fantastic.

“There is no point in comparing the 2020 as that was an insane year, but our turnover for the second half of the year has mostly been in line with 2019.

“I haven’t started paying back my Covid-19 loans yet so that will be an interesting challenge but mostly people have come back, and people are spending.

“The numbers are much more promising than I was afraid of.

“The games industry boomed over lockdown as everybody was stuck at home.

“People rediscovered games and jigsaws even more so than they have for the last five years, and they’ve kept doing that as time has gone on.”

So how are these businesses preparing for the Christmas rush?

Ottery is expecting a hard festive period this time around but is still hopeful of a positive end to 2021.

She said: “It is going to be slightly challenging for us as we have not had the opportunity to do much of the preparation work that would normally go into a Christmas.

“Around September I should been setting up stock lines, recommendations, social media campaigns and we just haven’t had the time or energy to do that this year because everyone has been so worn out by the pandemic.

“It will be harder than in a normal year but I’m not expecting it to be terrible.”

Meanwhile, Redrup is hopeful that the coming weeks can continue to remain busy and make up for lost time last year.

“It is much busier now [near Xmas] but people still want to buy online- people have got used to buying online after sitting at home for over a year.

“At the same time people are still excited.

“People are so much more friendly because they want to chat to people so coming in here is a much nicer experience [for people missing interaction].

“Christmas for us is when we make money, you cover costs through the year and hope to make some at Christmas.”