While enjoying the Waterlooville Classic Car Show on Saturday, we couldn’t help but spot a number of changes emerging in the main precinct area.
Obviously, most of the attention in recent months is focused on the building of Sainsburys and the activity on the old Marconi site, London Road precinct shops have some changes occurring too.
Blinkers café, which has been a mainstay of the precinct for as long as I can remember, seems to be undergoing a refurbishment. Perhaps the Costa coffee, Three Cooks and Café Havana are providing stiff competition?
Just a little further along, Winnie’s Chinese Restaurant appears to be undergoing renovation of its own. To be honest, we’ve never dined there and know of no-one that has, maybe it’s time we sampled their menu after the revamp?
We’ve already reported the remodel of the old McDonald’s restaurant will be a grabalaptop.com shop, and the store front has been rendered nicely for it’s grand opening on 26th July.
And, finally, hidden away down the end of the B*oulevard where there was briefly a pawn shop, “Get Gorgeous” is taking over the empty premises. Currently situated upstairs next to the library, this new Hair and Beauty Salon is due to open ‘soon’.
So, in a small area of the precinct there are positive but subtle changes developing. It’s great to see more shops opening, but sadly the old Baytree Bookshop and SelfFit shops are still empty and as we reported just the other day, the model shop has closed and the Rainbow Toy shop is also winding up.
The independent shops are fighting back – there’s life left in them yet and not all been assimilated by the big chains!
The main problem for independent shops in Waterlooville is the cost of renting the units. A lot of the buildings are private landlords who greedily keep their rental prices high ( I have personal experience of this) and then when you add the sky high Council Business Rates, it is a real struggle for small shops to stay in business. Ironically when researching prices before opening a shop in Waterlooville, it was found to be cheaper to rent a shop in Commercial road than Waterlooville. It is however starting to bite the landlords and council in the backside because the only businesses that can afford to stay open now are Charity shops (I’m assuming they get concessions from the Government). At last count recently there were at least 10 Charity shops in Waterlooville town!! And they wonder why Waterlooville isn’t attracting more shoppers. Waterlooville is already slipping down the hill to the retail park area and if the Council don’t do something soon, like drop their rates or force the landlords to reduce their rent levels, there won’t be much left! Waterlooville is already a dead town and it’s getting worse.
Minnows had their xmas meal there a couple of years ago, it was nice
Winnies does lovely food eaten there a few times, thoroughly recommended.
Thought winnies had gone? No answer on the phones for take aways and been empty since about Xmas.
Well Andy, It has indeed ‘gone’ and been empty for a while, but it seems to be being refurbished? No sign on the windows to confirm this, sadly. Do/did you recommend their takeaways?
Yes spot on and a real shame it may be gone.
Yes spot on and a real shame it may be gone.
Thanks for your comment Andy, hopefully they’ll be back. We’ll keep an eye on the shop.
I wish that every entrepreneur that opens a fast food outlet in Waterlooville visits Costa’s, Waitrose and others and learns about the importance of a “corporate image” and adopt a smart overall , apron with logo or whatever is appropriate for the business and dump the T shirt/baseball cap image which does not promote an image of
efficiency and most importantly hygiene.