There has been no Fish and Chips in Abingdon town centre since the Lemon Place and then Smarts closed.
Fish and Chips is a great British Institution, that has taken a battering over the last 40 years with the arrival of pizza, burgers, and kebabs. There will be Abingdon Fish & Chips, where the Chinese Kitchen closed last year. The new blue sign went up last week along with the pictures of Cod and Plaice and Scampi.
Visiting the Fairacres Retail Park at the weekend I see that shop fitting is underway in what was Beales. There is an application for Hammonds, a fitted furniture retailer, to put up their signs. I am not sure if Hammonds will take both units. I did hear at the barber on Saturday that part of it will be a carpet shop but have not seen anything definite.
The Phase 2 development of Fairacres has planning permission and will be started in 2019 where Homebase and AHF Furniture now are. Permission was given for one of the new units to sell food. The name M&S Food was cited in the planning application but we now know that looks more likely to be Aldi.
Carpetright have just made an announcement that they are restructuring and that will mean store closures. Not sure if that will affect Abingdon…
Specsavers have been celebrating 25 years in Bury Street at the weekend and have been giving out cake and goody bags. They moved from next to Greggs to the premises previously used by Halfords a few years ago. This gave them two floors and more space for opticians, hearing tests, and dispensing.
Other businesses that I think have been in Bury Street for 25, or more, years include:
New Look (moved)
Baker Oven (now Greggs)
Lunn Poly Travel (now Tui)
Mister Minit (now Timspon)
Supadrug (moved)
Abbey National (now Sandander)
Cancer Research Campaign
H Samuel
Dorothy Perkins
Boots (The Chemists)
Precinct Dental Practise
The Gift Centre (moved and now Abingdon Gallery )
The EFES Barbers has had a restyle. There is also a new notice in their window that says ‘Second Branch at 9 Market Place by the Museum’
Meanwhile Re Style has been re-named as EFES Barbers. There is a notice in their window that says ‘Second Branch at 17 High Street.’
They were always two branches of a close family business. 17 High Street came first, and 9 Market Place came soon after. The other two Turkish barbers trading in Abingdon are independent operators. Perhaps using the same name will make that point for anybody who was confused.