The Vacant Shops Academy

How much is your cultural and industrial heritage remembered, reflected and playing a part in your town or city centre today…?

Excited to be out & about in what is now the 45th location we’re supporting on tackling highstreet vacancy since starting The Vacant Shops Academy…

…and learned a lot on our visit to Cinderford.

It was fascinating to dip into Forest of Dean history, after seeing the mining references at the heart of the town, including the awesome Antony Dufort sculpture in the lead image and the traditional miner’s lamp-design clock tower in my second.

Our walk-see also took in…

• a strong group of independent shops and hospitality venues;
• a number of striking wall art examples which also had a strong local heritage theme;
• the historic, family-run independent cinema;
• the former bank conversion into a state-of-the-art, community-led music hub;
• The Triangle – its main town centre dwell-time and performance space – which also features a neat way to incorporate local dialect.

Oh and the “Unbelievable” bit…?

…that’s a reference to the blue plaque recognising hometown nineties band EMF and their big hit single (which if you’re like me, you’ll now have humming around your head for the next few minutes).

Cinderford also has an intriguing mix of buildings and we’re very much looking forward to working with the local team there on options and opportunities.

Watch this space…

I’m thinking on a train trip back to write a list of places that need, somehow, to get MORE units.

What…?

But we keep hearing about the highstreet struggling, reading the still-dominant ‘death of the…’ narrative and being told that nationally we’ve 40% more retail space than we need.

Thing is, to get to any of those you have to ignore totally the places that are getting short of units to meet demand…

…town and city centres that don’t have enough available units for retail or leisure brands who’d like to be there to move into. Imagine that. High profile brand X, who residents or existing businesses would love to have here, cannot find a unit. It’s happening, and we’re not talking isolated instances either.

Same is true for independents keen to expand or switch to a stronger spot in their town or city centre. Or for uses on our ‘alternative’ / additional list that runs from arts & crafts to health & wellbeing. Struggling to find somewhere to go.

It’s because, thanks to a combination of policy with unintended consequences and decisions being made as if ‘death of…’ was a thing, some places are all out of suitable empty and available units.

Some have been knocked down, others converted to resi or office or taken up by varying business types encouraged by the change in use class guidance, because at the time it was thought not to matter what units were let to: “it’s better than being empty”.

So now that list of places – and it’s not short – could do with finding some new units. Build them…? Reclaim them from uses that aren’t really adding to the mix…? Try to re-purpose un- and under-used upper floors…? None of that’s easy.

But we need find a way.

It’d be great to hear your thoughts…

“High Street units wanted.”

“Please do get in touch with the team about any new opportunities.”

These, from two different national retail brands, are the latest published new location asks we’ve seen.

The first is from Screwfix for their new ‘City’ format and includes a 30-strong list of target places. The second, by Savers Health Home & Beauty, was part of a post celebrating their three new store openings in a single week.

Thanks to connections with commercial agents and property directors, we’re seeing a lot like these and as well as contributing to the positive sense I have about the highstreet going forward, there’s also a very practical reason they’re great to be across.

They’re a big motivation for our efforts to encourage local place teams to work on reducing their headline vacancy rate together. Getting a heads up about who might by looking to invest in your town or city centre, knowing what units you have available that might suit them, and then reaching out with those details can make a difference to the outcome.

It’s often the case that the target list is longer than the final set of new stores they actually open, so in a way it’s competitive.

Does your town or city centre routinely reach out to would-be occupiers – not just brands, but also independent occupiers or those from our arts & crafts to health & wellbeing group of ‘alternative’ / additional go-to use types.

I’d love to talk you through the ‘place partnership’ approach that this is a key part of…

The high street is evolving…

• A former restaurant building will soon be a church;
• An ex-pharmacy is being repurposed for a restaurant;
• The home of a landmark department store is now an hotel;
• The space that was once occupied by a national retailer has been split into three and now hosts a group of indies.

But there’s also…

• A famous international brand opening up in this city shopping centre;

…and a retail name (see lead image) that we thought was gone, is back (in 32 locations – so far…?).

Just a small sample, from one location on a single out & about day, but we could point you to similar from town and city centres we’re working with on tackling vacancy up and down the country – including a flurry of indie openings now comfortably into double figures so early in the ‘26 lettings season.

Yes it’s challenging, for sure there’s much to do. Places are moving forward at different paces. But it must be giving those still defaulting to the “struggling”, “death of…” narrative a reason or two to rethink…?

Or is it just me…? What do you think…

4 new openings this year on a single town centre street…

…is just one of the encouraging stories emerging from locations we’re working with on tackling #highstreet vacancy.

What’s new from independents in your town or city centre. It’d be great to hear…!

The 4 story is from Tredegar (pictured is one of those, Honey Bea Art Gallery).

There’s also…

• A yarn-store, community space and knitting resource opening in Abertillery on Saturday; 
  
  
• A bar / restaurant with live music on the weekends gearing up to open in Ammanford, Carmarthenshire;
  
  
• A new sushi bar opening in Crewe town centre on Sunday;
  
  
• …adding to neighbouring indies launching in Llanelli town centre (one just before, Christmas, one just after), a second-hand bookshop & cafe just opened in Dunfermline and before long a new Turkish Restaurant & Cafe for Stirling city centre.

And there’ll be more.

As we always say, it’s challenging still and there’s much to do but – especially considering it’s still very early in the 2026 lettings season – there are #HighStreetPositives too.

So a good moment to say huge credit to the owners of all these new businesses and their teams for the ideas and investment and energy they’re devoting.

And to finish – hoping she won’t mind – I wanted to share these words from a post by the owner of Janna’s Bakery in Stirling who’s also behind that new opening there:

“A new chapter. A step forward. A moment I wanted to pause and take in. This journey hasn’t been easy, but it has been full of lessons, growth, and incredible support. I feel very grateful and very proud of how far I’ve come — and excited for what’s ahead.”

But I think I’m okay to go walk-see Banbury town centre.

It’s a place that I’ve always thought has a huge amount going for it: heritage buildings, a sizeable independents group, lots of pedestrianised space, proactive shopping centre team, the award-winning Lock29 destination, canal with a developing leisure offer on both sides, a sprinkling of uses from our ‘alternative’ / additional list taking up units, and more.

Personally it’s also been a significant part of my own journey and taught me a lot, including town team time and a short BID interim.

It has all the players you need for a tackling vacancy-focused ‘place partnership’ too – agents, landlords, businesses, community, cultural organisations, councils, chamber, BID – but I’m wondering if they are all working closely together on this issue.

As I’ll often say, it’s really hard to tell from just a walk see, without taking time to investigate the back story of each empty unit, exactly what the picture is.

Visibly the headline vacancy rate looks to be in the mid / low teens percent, but it has some landmark buildings and long-time empties it’d be great to see back in play and lots positive to offer as a place to would-be new occupiers that makes me think getting the numbers down is do-able with a concerted, collaborative effort.

Does that describe your town or city centre too…? Do you have more empty units than you’d like…? Are residents and existing businesses unhappy with the changing mix of uses…?

It’d be good to hear from you…

What would you change…?

With the government promising to publish a ‘High Streets Strategy’ later this year, I thought to share again the tackling #highstreet vacancy-focused ‘manifesto’ I drew up in May ‘24 in the run up to that year’s election.

The aim is to deliver the policy and regulation adjusts that will help places try halve their headline vacancy rate and drop the long-stuck national empties percentage into single figures.

I know there are elements of what follows that #property and #placemaking colleagues disagree on.

It’d be great to hear what you think…

So here goes…!

• Ask (and resource) every local authority to report on vacancy numbers twice a year, and work with agents, landlords, businesses, community, cultural organisations, chamber and BID where there is one to overcome barriers to let to include…

Give them scope to override national use class guidance and permitted development rules in line with local priorities;

• Create new powers to end business rates avoidance and evasion and allow flexibility to incentivise tackling vacancy eg around thresholds, ‘fit to occupy’, listed building charity (and CIC) and second unit reliefs;

Strengthen (and resource) regulations to enforce minimum ‘fit to occupy’ standards on all highstreet buildings;

• Sweep away the additional letting requirements on councils when they are landlords so that local authorities are all beacons of good practice;

Require every vacant highstreet unit to be marketed with a registered agent and the place to have a publicly available empty & available units listing;

• Change the process which keep units empty when the previous tenant went into administration or left with time to go on their lease;

Build funds to support community right to buy including the co-ordination and property skills to make it happen and be sustainable;

• Develop a series of popup use projects leading to longer pilots based on successful examples for arts & crafts, culture, creative and community uses;

Mandate all NHS Trusts to work with their places to develop accessible first contact & diagnostic services in town & city centres;

• Encourage and resource places to ‘audit’ and develop strategies to reduce un- and under-used space on upper floors of vacant and occupied units.

What would you add / adjust…?

Let’s get places to try halve their headline vacancy rate and drop the long-stuck national empties percentage into single figures.

Reading that the government is planning to publish a ‘High Streets Strategy’ later this year, I thought to table again the top item on my tackling #highstreet vacancy ‘manifesto’…

“Ask (and resource) every local authority to report on vacancy numbers twice a year, and work with agents, landlords, businesses, community, cultural organisations, chamber and BID where there is one plus others identified locally, to help overcome barriers to getting empty units let…”

We’ve had no luck getting that yet, but if at first you don’t succeed…

And why, if you were government, wouldn’t you do it…?

We know the approach works. Places started doing it a dozen or so years ago, more are now and seeing chunks come out of their empty units numbers.

It’d be good for growth, create jobs, deliver revenue to councils, contribute to increasing housing availability, help with health improvement targets and with sustainability, boost ‘pride in place’ and much more. A whole raft of local and national government objectives supported with one measure.

It’s also – and I guess I would say this – a much more cost effective approach than some of the big ticket spend things we’ve tried in recent years.

I get that there are accompanying policy and regulation adjusts we’d need too, but as I’ve said, the prize is to see a lengthy list of town and city centres halve their headline vacancy rate in 18 months as well as improve the mix of uses there.

Nationally that’s going to cut the overall rate from the 13.5–14% it’s been at for ages, into – if enough places get on the case – single figures.

Anyone think that’s a plan…? Or want to tell me why not…?

It’d be great to hear from you.