Durham’s Silver Street has reduced vacant and available shop units from 11 to four in a year. What’s the secret?

Anyone in the North East will likely have seen or read something about Durham’s Silver Street in the last fortnight – and, for once, it’s all positive coverage of a high street story!

For those not familiar with what I do, my role in Durham is that I spend three days a month managing the Indie Durham City business support project – which launched during lockdown in 2020 and is currently funded until March 2024 – on behalf of City of Durham Parish Council.

During Covid, Silver Street faced many of the same challenges as other high streets around the country, losing big names such as Topshop, Carphone Warehouse, M&Co, Clintons, Superdry and Hotter – on top of the M&S that had already departed in 2018.

In many cases, these were due to companies collapsing or downsizing at the national level, rather than a Durham-specific problem, though that subtlety is often lost when people are only really familiar with their own local high street.

A year ago, in January 2022, the street had 11 voids – though that was itself a slight improvement on the worst period two years earlier.

Now, 12 months on – and as reported in the Northern Echo and on BBC Look North (above) – the situation is much healthier, with six new arrivals in place, three more let or under offer, and two departures, reducing the number of available empty units from 11 to just four.

New arrivals

The new arrivals are:

Before	After
Topshop	Grape Tree (national) and student housing upstairs
EE	Moon Jewellery (independent, upsize from next door)
Greenwoods	Durham Ginstitute (independent) and student housing upstairs (relocation from less prime site elsewhere in city)
Clintons	Tortilla (national)
Hotter	Kokoro (national)
Post Office (vacant since 2016)	Vodafone (national, relocation)

Coming soon

And coming soon are:

Before	After
Moon Jewellery	Let to T4 Bubble Tea (national)
Superdry	Under offer, with new student housing upstairs
Mountain Warehouse	Under offer, with new student housing upstairs

In addition, independent leisure complex STACK is taking all floors of the ex-M&S, replacing current short-term ground-floor occupant Yorkshire Trading Company, which we are still keen to keep elsewhere in the city.

Vacant and available

Elsewhere in the street, these four units are still vacant and available:

Before	After
Carphone Warehouse	No marketing, as far as I can tell
Cafe Ravika	Recently vacated
Pret	Marketed by Bradley Hall
Vodafone	Recently vacated due to relocation, and marketed by Graham S Hall

So what is the secret?

So, how has this progress been achieved?

There’s no magic formula, and it’s worth recognising that Durham has character and appeal that not all places can offer – though that’s partly why trading there is often prohibitively expensive.

However, my Northern Echo column and the Look North report highlight many of the key themes:

Local place leaders – Durham County Council, City of Durham Parish Council, Durham BID, Durham Markets, etc. – working closely together, and actively engaging with landlords, agents, businesses and other organisations. This is absolutely key – we are all supporting and amplifying each other, and pushing forward in the same direction.

Landlords proactively reconfiguring properties to carve off upper floors and create right-sized ground floor units (with more affordable rates and rents as a result)

Agents – especially the locally based ones who best understand the area – doing a good job of matching up units and occupants, and encouraging landlords to be realistic about their rental expectations.

Durham’s local councillors and other key stakeholders recognising and accepting that town and city centres need to embrace a greater mix of uses – including leisure and residential, as well as retail – though I still detect some resistance to granting more premises licences, even when the new quality venues in question are far from being “vertical drinking” establishments.

Relentless positive place promotion at the local and national levels – in my case via the Indie Durham City social channels, and working with friendly colleagues in the media – to celebrate successes and counter the inevitable negative chatter that surrounds any place as it evolves

Provision of free marketing and mentoring support from me to any existing, new or aspiring independent business in Durham city centre, thanks to the Parish Council’s funding for the Indie Durham City project. Over the last three years, I’ve helped countless Durham businesses gain extra exposure via social media, newspapers, radio and TV, but also been there as a source of encouragement, sometimes offering moral support (when businesses have needed a friendly ear) and at other times practical help (such as assisting businesses to find premises, deal with rent or rate issues, figure out who to talk to about a particular issue, or get to grips with their own social media, website or Google presence). In Durham, this work complements and works alongside the excellent Business Improvement District, but it’s also a model that could work in places that want to increase support to local businesses but don’t have capacity to fund or operate a BID.

What next?

While we can be pleased with the positive progress in Durham, there is always more to do.

Some new arrivals and old favourites will sadly fail, and this churn will mean that there are units that need filling again in the future.

Elsewhere in the city, we still have some stubborn voids that will be almost impossible to viably let unless business rates are reformed or those properties, like the ones in Silver Street, are extensively reconfigured.

However, I’m detecting an energy in the city – and even a positivity on social media – that hasn’t been present for a while, summed up beautifully by Moon Jewellery owner Jo in the Look North report:

“We come to Durham now and we smile, and it’s a great community. We love it!”

Durham doesn’t have all the answers, but by embracing some of the principles of how we are going about things, there’s no reason why other towns and cities can’t have more to smile about too!

A version of this article was originally published on LinkedIn.

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