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Quench, Bon Marche and Dash to go

2:56pm Monday 19th December 2011 in News By Manisha Mistry

Guy Marshall: retiring. Guy Marshall: retiring.

A BOOK shop in St Albans will close its doors at the end of the month and its manager will be looking forward to retirement after 30 years of being in the trade.

Guy Marshall, manager at Christian bookshop Quench in Holywell Hill, said a number of factors have resulted in the shop's closure.

However competition from internet booksellers has been the major contributing factor, Mr Marshall said.

He added: "The number of people coming into the shop has dramatically dropped in the last few years, but the main problem we have is people now prefer to shop on the internet.

"In Holywell Hill we don't have any parking for shoppers and we don't have as much space in the shop as we used to at other locations within St Albans."

Mr Marshall said before the store moved to Holywell Hill it was located in London Road, opposite the former Odeon cinema, where there was room for a meeting area where people could sit and have a coffee.

Quench will close on December 31 and Mr Marshall, who has been selling Christian books in St Albans for 30 years, will retire.

Clothes shop Dash in Christopher Place is also closing in coming weeks, as is Bon Marche in St Peters Street, the Review can reveal.

Comments(1)

fight rates says...
4:31pm Tue 20 Dec 11

This is very sad news. It seems that every week we have another shop closure. You can add Snappy Snaps, Maltings Juice Bar, Jackie Browns, Pronta Print, Shiang & In time Furniture, amongst others who have closed or moved elsewhere in the last month. For us retailers the council & the Government make it harder each year for us to survive. This year the council put up the parking fees by 20%, they then stopped free parking in Holywell Hill. Next year the government is putting up Business rates/ council tax for shops by a record 5.6% increase. This is the 14th year that rates have gone up! Yet council tax has been frozen for 4 years. Hardly fair on struggling retailers. So get ready for more closures next year!

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