Debenhams

[KiwiScot 1,436]

Major player now for the axe with all stores going to go.

[horsefly 4,287]

Terrible! And while the Government threatens to cost the country billions in "protecting "our" fishing waters", an industry employing about 14,000 workers, double the number of workers have their livelihoods likely to be destroyed by the failure of Debenhams and Arcadia in just the last couple of days. 

[SHRIMPER 328]

Our store called Jermyns pre Debenhams went months ago. Served the town for over a hundred years.Best shop in the town and sadly missed.

[horsefly 4,287]

4 minutes ago, SHRIMPER said:

Our store called Jermyns pre Debenhams went months ago. Served the town for over a hundred years.Best shop in the town and sadly missed.

Meanwhile Amazon mops up all the trade and pays virtually no tax. I have never bought from those crooks and I hope many more will begin to boycott companies like this and support the highstreet stores.

[Barbe bleu 814]

6 minutes ago, horsefly said:

Meanwhile Amazon mops up all the trade and pays virtually no tax. I have never bought from those crooks and I hope many more will begin to boycott companies like this and support the highstreet stores.

 Amazon has become a default setting for many and we all need to think if that is healthy.  There are always alternatives online and on the high street.

[horsefly 4,287]

11 minutes ago, Barbe bleu said:

 Amazon has become a default setting for many and we all need to think if that is healthy.  There are always alternatives online and on the high street.

It's healthy for the economy and society to check out how companies treat their workers, if they pay their taxes, then buy from them.

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

2 hours ago, horsefly said:

Terrible! And while the Government threatens to cost the country billions in "protecting "our" fishing waters", an industry employing about 14,000 workers, double the number of workers have their livelihoods likely to be destroyed by the failure of Debenhams and Arcadia in just the last couple of days. 

Harrods has a bigger annual turnover than the UK fishing industry.

[Herman 9,714]

 Please support your small shops if you can. Do not buy from amazon even if it means paying a bit extra. Most of the time you don't. 

[Creative Midfielder 1,985]

5 hours ago, horsefly said:

Meanwhile Amazon mops up all the trade and pays virtually no tax. I have never bought from those crooks and I hope many more will begin to boycott companies like this and support the highstreet stores.

Me neither but unfortunately we appear to be in a very small minority 🙄

I would like to think people will follow your advice but with only a month left before the transition period ends the reality is that whilst the EU attempts to curb the excesses of these global tech companies, the UK government will carry on giving them a free pass and that makes them almost impossible to compete against.

Sadly, big though Debenhams are, I think we are still in the very early days of the mayhem that is going to unfold in UK retail in the next few months.....

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

Trying to stay local. The only universal shops we have are Wilkos, Boots and Superdrug. Supermarkets aside that is.

We have some good local shops that are not too much more expensive than the biggies so its not much of a hardship. But we have to shop nationally for clothes as the are just aren't any in the town or area.ar

But you are snookered for fuel and groceries.

 

[sonyc 5,491]

6 hours ago, SHRIMPER said:

Our store called Jermyns pre Debenhams went months ago. Served the town for over a hundred years.Best shop in the town and sadly missed.

A touch old fashioned it was too (nothing wrong with that by the way) but it offered a wide range of good quality clothes, kitchenware etc and very was a decent employer with many people working there a long time. On a Saturday it had the benefit of being close to the market and it was always busy. Such a shame to hear it has gone.

[ricardo 7,346]

I remember them building the Norwich Debenhams when I was a small  child. My earliest memories are from when it was a bombsite. My mum used to park her bike against the railings that surrounded it when she went shopping at Woolworths.

It was the first shop in Norwich to have an escalator. Us kids used to queue up and keep going up and down until the manager came and chased us off. Simple pleasures in a time of real austerity.

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

8 minutes ago, ricardo said:

I remember them building the Norwich Debenhams when I was a small  child. My earliest memories are from when it was a bombsite. My mum used to park her bike against the railings that surrounded it when she went shopping at Woolworths.

It was the first shop in Norwich to have an escalator. Us kids used to queue up and keep going up and down until the manager came and chased us off. Simple pleasures in a time of real austerity.

Curls

[ricardo 7,346]

20 minutes ago, keelansgrandad said:

Curls

Yep, thats what it was when it first opened.👍

[Daz Sparks 1,150]

20 minutes ago, ricardo said:

Yep, thats what it was when it first opened.👍

http://www.georgeplunkett.co.uk/Norwich/Road Schemes/Orford Place Curls Red Lion St view south [4346] 1955-08-05.jpg

This is Curls under construction, yes?

[ricardo 7,346]

36 minutes ago, Daz Sparks said:

http://www.georgeplunkett.co.uk/Norwich/Road Schemes/Orford Place Curls Red Lion St view south [4346] 1955-08-05.jpg

This is Curls under construction, yes?

Yes

Before they started building, the site was used as a car park in what must have been the basement of the bombed building. 

I think it was originally Caleys chocolate factory. My mother worked there before WW2.

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

4 hours ago, ricardo said:

Yep, thats what it was when it first opened.👍

When Mum died in 92, we found an unopened Curls bag with a linen tablecloth inside. It definitely had old money on the label as well.

[SHRIMPER 328]

14 hours ago, sonyc said:

A touch old fashioned it was too (nothing wrong with that by the way) but it offered a wide range of good quality clothes, kitchenware etc and very was a decent employer with many people working there a long time. On a Saturday it had the benefit of being close to the market and it was always busy. Such a shame to hear it has gone.

The old shop before the drastic boarding over of the wonderful ceilings and covering up of the plasterwork was a joy. Biggest sacrilege was painting the wonderful staircase a dull black colour. Over a hundred years of hands had given the wood the most glorious patina that everyone looks for in old wood. What will become of the great building now is anybodies guess.

[sonyc 5,491]

1 hour ago, SHRIMPER said:

The old shop before the drastic boarding over of the wonderful ceilings and covering up of the plasterwork was a joy. Biggest sacrilege was painting the wonderful staircase a dull black colour. Over a hundred years of hands had given the wood the most glorious patina that everyone looks for in old wood. What will become of the great building now is anybodies guess.

Yes, I remember the staircase and the ceilings / cornices as well as some nice pillars I seem to recall. It had an old world feel that actually will come full circle and be back in vogue (already, older famous shops on the continent make a play for the shopping 'experience' and service). I suppose Jermyn's / then Debenhams will have simply got absorbed in the shop fitting fashion of the day and someone in charge will have had little imagination.

It's the same in planning throughout the country  (houses in conservation areas with very unsympathetic windows etc etc.....but I better not get started here. It's one domain of my worldview that is exceedingly conservative and I will admit, reactionary).

Edited December 2, 2020 by sonyc

[SHRIMPER 328]

It was Jermyn & Perry at one time. This first picture of the old shop after the fire was taken in 1887 one year before my father was born. You will remember the second inside shot.

 

[sonyc 5,491]

3 minutes ago, SHRIMPER said:

It was Jermyn & Perry at one time. This first picture of the old shop after the fire was taken in 1887 one year before my father was born. You will remember the second inside shot.

 

Yes, recall those splayed iron pillars. You can see the whole structural skeleton of the place. Light used to stream in too via those roof lights. Great to see.

The balcony at some stage will have had railings I'm very sure, to be subsequently replaced with safety glass to meet regulations.

[sonyc 5,491]

In terms of architectural vandalism no city probably beats Bradford in willful modernisation! Probably worthy here of little more than passing interest but here is just one building lost. Lamented by JB Priestley. The 60s buildings that replaced it was demolished a couple of years ago as well as dozens of other concrete monoliths that barely lasted 50 years.

Halifax, on the other hand has preserved it's arcades (and Piece Hall) if anyone has ever visited.

 

[PurpleCanary 5,554]

17 hours ago, keelansgrandad said:

Curls

I had a school-holiday job there, a long time ago, when it was still Curls.

[horsefly 4,287]

Debenhams fat cats raked in £35m during years before collapse (msn.com)

 

Anyone remotely surprised by the following? I doubt it, and isn't that fact itself a rather sad indictment of the state of modern Britain. We've been turned into a spiv nation.

Debenhams fat cats raked in £35m during years before collapse

The top brass at Debenhams raked in more than £35million in pay and perks in the years leading up to its collapse, a Mail audit has found. 

And analysis of its accounts by the Mail has found that bosses who led the retailer through its return to the stock market and the subsequent turmoil raked in millions of pounds every year. 

This includes former chief executive Rob Templeman, who was in charge from 2003 to 2011 and made at least £7.9million in pay. 

Despite leading Debenhams when it piled on more than £1billion in debt – and paid out £1billion in dividends to its private equity owners – he claimed this week that he left the company in good stead and bore no responsibility for its recent problems. 

Successor Michael Sharp, who was chief executive until 2016, also pocketed at least £10.4million over 12 years, seven of them as Templeman's deputy. 

Former Amazon executive Sergio Bucher, who took over in 2016 and presided over Debs' first collapse into administration in 2019, received £2.3million in pay. 

Former Debenhams chairman John Lovering, who held his post from 2003 to 2010, was paid £1.5million, while Nigel Northridge, his successor until 2016, was handed £1.1million. Sir Ian Cheshire, who took over next, received £527,000 for three years' work. 

Finance chief Chris Woodhouse served from 2003 to 2012 and was paid £6.4million overall. His successor Simon Henrick, in the job from 2012 to 2014, was paid £1.2million and Matt Smith, who took over from 2015, pocketed £1.9million. Suzanne Harlow, group trading director from 2014 to 2017, received £2.1million. 

[Bill 1,788]

'gawd blimeys guvnor.....it haint for the likes of hus to be questioning the likes of 'em, them's our betters hand no mistake

why, they told hus to vote for brexit, so wees be better horf hout hof it,

hand I halways does wot them fellas tells us'

[horsefly 4,287]

11 minutes ago, Bill said:

'gawd blimeys guvnor.....it haint for the likes of hus to be questioning the likes of 'em, them's our betters hand no mistake

why, they told hus to vote for brexit, so wees be better horf hout hof it,

hand I halways does wot them fellas tells us'

Bimey! wus forgettin' me place there for a minute. Thankee kindly for the reminder Bill. I nearly gorn and made a roight ol' fool o' meself thinkin' me betters din't have a right to our hard earned cash

[PurpleCanary 5,554]

Ah. I hadn't realised this was a new feature of the forum, but very much to be welcomed - posters vying  with one another to do a worse cockney accent/impersonation than **** van ****'s. Hard to split the contributions so far.

[A Load of Squit 5,128]

11 hours ago, PurpleCanary said:

Ah. I hadn't realised this was a new feature of the forum, but very much to be welcomed - posters vying  with one another to do a worse cockney accent/impersonation than **** van ****'s. Hard to split the contributions so far.

Ha ha, loving the censorship on Organ Van Scissor Sister's name. 😀

[How I Wrote Elastic Man 1,181]

20 hours ago, PurpleCanary said:

Ah. I hadn't realised this was a new feature of the forum, but very much to be welcomed - posters vying  with one another to do a worse cockney accent/impersonation than **** van ****'s. Hard to split the contributions so far.

You haven't heard my real accent after leaving Norfolk and spending 30 years in Essex, Kent and Sussex 😫

[How I Wrote Elastic Man 1,181]

On 01/12/2020 at 23:17, keelansgrandad said:

When Mum died in 92, we found an unopened Curls bag with a linen tablecloth inside. It definitely had old money on the label as well.

I've just been googling old money and found out that there was a double Florin issued between 1887 and 1890. It is still apparently legal tender, worth 20p. 

But it seems they sell for anything between £10 and £100+ depending on condition 

All coin values