Market Drayton bucking the trend over empty shops

Three years ago Market Drayton had 39 empty shops, with the town centre "dying", a councillor said.

But now it is looking revitalised with the number of empty shops due to be as low as nine by next month.

Shropshire councillor for the town Roger Hughes said it was thanks to Market Drayton's pioneering approach to improving the state of the town centre.

He said: "We have had a huge drop in the number of empty shops in the town, we are bucking the trend."

Councillor Hughes said that of the shops that had reopened in the town since 2011, only one – the Newlife shop on Cheshire Street – was a charity shop.

The town was awarded £425,000 from Shropshire Council's Market Towns Revitalisation Programme three years ago.

Councillor Hughes said: "We got a private company in to manage the market which was dying, but that is now one of the success stories of Shropshire and is as thriving and busy as it has ever been, and has even doubled in size. We also became concerned with the state of the empty shops and the rents that were being charged.

"So we gave out grants worth a total of £90,000 to 20 or so businesses to help improve the shop fronts and for structural improvements, which in turn improved the look of the town."

Traders were also given advice by the Shropshire Council and business consultancy company Grey 4 Gold.

Councillor Hughes also puts a lot of the resurgence down to "incubator" units at the Buttercross, off Cheshire Street, where people can get a stall on a cheap and short-term lease to establish their business.