The Glassworks

A few updates I’m aware of:

Frasers Group have updated their plans and will no longer be opening a unit under the Flannels name in Barnsley. They are keeping the unit, but the store will open under a different brand name and it won’t open until much later this year.

The fit out of River Island has started this week.

Cineworld is unlikely to open until September (not confirmed).

Nando’s should be open by March.

 

Very worrying news.

Cineworld not opening till then is a major major blow. I don't think it will ever open sadly. Flannels not opening is a big blow after its announcement. What else do Frazer's have?

Also I saw the foot thing opening. Again it's not a shop and now I'm really worried there will be hardly any retail at all.


Good news on River Island

 

What the retailers need to is make sure they have more of their range and choices in store. I say this using Next as an example. They’ve moved into a nice new unit, opened a coffee shop as well, yet their menswear dept is very small and has a very limited range. I was disappointed at what the Barnsley store had to offer and eventually visited the store in Meadowhall and made a purchase there.

 

Some of the units are leased as ‘kiosks’ rather than shopping units and were always intended for smaller retailers/independents. The Foot Health practice is taking a tiny kiosk unit on Cheapside.

The Cineworld fit out takes a while, but I’m not 100% on the September opening. But everything does seem to be delayed even further than originally stated.

 

I agree. The choice is often limited (especially for men) in smaller stores. The cafe in next is owned by Massarella.

 

It’ll be almost identical to Flannels, just not the Flannels name!

 

I'm glad the foot clinic is on cheap side rather than in the glassworks itself. I like the idea of small independent units but expected them to be independent shops.

I'm still struggling to think what flannels could possibly be is there a USC inside sports direct?

 

I don’t want to say too much and get in trouble, but the brand name they’ll be using is listed somewhere here:

https://frasers.group/brands

 

Any news on the bridge?

 

I think a lot of shops have completely got it wrong with menswear. I know they have researchers and figures and things but my gut still says they have it massively wrong. Not one of the high street shops has a large range of men's casual clothing. I don't mean the glassworks or anything I mean in general.

 

Yay sofa.com

 

It’s really sad the direction sofa.com has taken under Ashley’s ownership.

I got a sofa from them when they’d only got a handful of places and their main showroom was in an old disused warehouse. Still have it and it’s still in really good nick.

We looked at tarting up the living room a few years back and looked at sofa.com first. The quality of cushions had really gone down hill and the stitching and finishing was really shoddy.

Shame, but so common in companies that pass from the first generation who created and cared to a group just bothered about squeezing profit.

Though to be fair, we looked at quite a few sofa places and we were pretty underwhelmed.

 

They're all the same these days. Sofa.com SCS, sofology, DFS. All the same tat

 

Yeah this is common - especially with anything Mike Ashley takes over.

 

I haven’t heard anything, other than they’re now classing that part of the project (bridge and public realm on Midland Street) as Glassworks Phase 3. There are no excuses for it not to be built this year.

 

loaf were quite decent, but we couldn’t find the right design, so we stuck with our old comfy one til it wears out.

Was also nice to see loaf not discounting, think most discounts were tens of pounds in their sale.

 

When DFS can supposedly drop the price of a sofa by £500 it’s fairly obvious what their profit margins must be.

 

Anyone heard anything about M&S since the posts here last year?

Also, I hear Wilko's are moving out of Rotherham (and many other towns) but fortunately is remaining here.

A great shame that WHSmith hasn't moved back too.

 

Nothing new since last year, but still hearing the same rumours about them moving to the Peel Centre. The old Maplin and Poundworld units are under offer from the same tenant and the total floor space is very similar to a typical M&S Foodhall.