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A television and press campaign will be unveiled next week to try and cut the number of people working from home and help revive city centres which have been particularly badly hit over the summer as footfall has slumped. The campaign will emphasise the benefits of people returning to their workplaces and encourage more businesses to make their offices Covid-19 secure.
Cardiff retailer Tony Christofaro summed up the views of many city centre operators who have seen business decimated in recent months. “This government campaign will definitely help us out because we need more commuters coming into the city. They are a huge part of our business: they account for around 70% of our shoppers so we need them back as soon as possible.”
Such was the impact of lockdown on commuters that he was forced to close his Spar store, which is close to the city’s Queen Street railway station, for five months. He only re-opened the 1,000sq ft outlet yesterday (1 September) but trading results on his first day back were very disappointing. “Today has not been good at all – it is quite disappointing because it was a bit of a gamble to re-open at this moment. There is just nobody around and the city still feels really dead. Perhaps next week will be better with the kids back at school and I just hope there wil extra footfall here then.”
Jas Randhawa, who has four outlets in central London, also welcomed the government initiative. “The government badly needs to revive London because at the moment it is a ghost town. I think they can do it by concentrating on business people who have been reluctant to return to work up to now. Perhaps the opening of the schools will encourage these people to return to work.
“The government must do something to get London moving again. The number of people using the underground is about 20% of what it was pre-lockdown and we can see that in our trade which is down by about 60% since the epidemic started.”
Randhawa, who has a 850sq ft Simply Fresh outlet in St James’s Park tube station and three other independent outlets in Victoria, Farringdon and Baker Street, added: “We have been hugely affected by the lockdown so something must be done quickly to revive the city and encourage more people to come back.”
Another city where retailers have been hit hard by the lockdown is Belfast where a survey shows only 5% of office-based staff have returned to work. Retail NI chief executive Glyn Roberts said: “It is absolutely vital that the executive now works with business on a strategy for the safe return of office workers to their place of work. This is crucial, not just for Belfast, but for the economic future of all major towns and cities in Northern Ireland.
“Office workers provide a large amount of footfall and trade for retail and hospitality sectors in many of our high streets. Given that both sectors are facing severe difficulties at the minute, the return of office workers is vitally important for their future viability.”
