Radley Village - News - Closure of Village Shop

Location, history and wildlife

Closure of Village Shop

[Posted 23/03/2005]

Until recently the village had a shop, which, under the management of Derek Nutt, has served the village well for 17 years. The shop has had to close due to a combination of circumstances. These include expiry of the lease, and insufficient turnover. The latter has been attributed to lack of support by the community. However, to be fair, the shop existed to support the community, not the other way round, and other factors have contributed to its demise, such as lack of investment and opportunity themselves driven by uncertainties over the lease and the future of the site.

Now that the shop has closed, the existing premises will shortly be demolished to make way for new development. However all is not lost. The existing planning permission granted for the development is conditional upon maintaining a shop premises. All it needs is someone willing to take it on, either as a business, or as a non-profit community service. Therefore, it is to be hoped that we will see a new shop of some sort on the site before too long.

Local (out of town) shopping facilities currently exist at the Peachcroft Centre and in Kennington (See shop page for further details). Newspaper deliveries in the village are now provided by Dillons in Peachcroft.

[Updated 22/07/2005]

Demolition of the shop has begun. Demolition contractors moved onto the site this week and have begun work.

[Updated 10/09/2005]

The shop is gone! Work is underway on the replacement building.

[Updated 04/05/2006]

The new building is complete and includes space for a shop on the ground floor. However noone has taken up possession of this premises, mainly due to the limited amount of space.

The Parish Council has been looking into the possibility of operating a community shop in the Village and a questionnaire has been circulated to all residents to ascertain the level of interest both from those who might be willing to operate such a shop, and those who would be its customers.

Please complete and return the questionnaire. It is important if the Village is ever to regain its shop.

[Updated 28/09/2006]

Following a public meeting in June, the Radley Village Shop Working Group has been working on proposals for establishing a new community shop in Radley. These will be presented and discussed at a public meeting in the Village Hall on 18 October 2006. Your support is needed.

See full story for further details.

[Updated 10/02/2007]

The new village community shop project is now well underway. The new shop premises, on the site of the old one, have been acquired and refitting is currently underway. It is planned to open around Easter. For further details, visit the new shop website.

If you have pledged to buy shares, you should, by now, have been contacted about this. Please make your payment promptly. Without your money, the project cannot proceed!

[Updated 13/05/2007]

The new Village Community Shop opens for the first time at 7.00am on Tuesday May 22. See separate News Story. For further details about opening hours etc, visit the new shop website.

[Updated 22/05/2007]

As from 7.00am today, the new Radley Village Shop is now open for business.