The times they are a-changin’ as shoppers stay home later – Kevin Buckle

Even before Covid shops were empty until after noon so expect more to open as late as 11am, writes Kevin Buckle

Shopping habits were changing even before the onset of Covid-19

For many years I used to get the train into the city centre for work while for the last couple of years I’ve been getting the bus and one difference is that you tended to get to know the people you regularly saw on the train while with the bus while I’ve got to know those at the same bus stop quite well you don’t tend to talk to folk on the bus the way you do on a train.

I realise this was partly because the inevitable disruptions to train journeys from time to time tended to bond regular passengers together as they tried to find out what was going on and how best to get home. Anyway it was from these train journeys that I got to know many of the managers and senior staff of quite a few of the shops in the city centre long before any pandemic.

One of the themes of conversation often discussed was whether the opening times of shops would ever dramatically change. This might have been before Covid but it was post the slump in high street sales and generally shops were not busy at all until after noon and depending on the time of year would be dead again by 5pm.

In busier times there had been plenty to get on with during the quieter periods – processing orders in the morning and tidying up later on – but as things got quieter these jobs could all be done without any need to be open at 9am and closing at 6pm or 7pm.

Even before the high street had started to be affected by online sales people’s shopping habits had changed and shopping in the morning had declined. As sales dropped what sales there were became more focused on the five hours from noon to 5pm. Certainly Avalanche had always been busy up to 6pm but generally it was said that with so many people having moved to flexi-time many office workers in particular were choosing to finish at 4pm. This was certainly true on my journey where the 4.26pm train was the most popular by far.

Given Avalanche’s location in Waverley Mall certainly pre-pandemic I could see at first hand that there was footfall to the station that probably justified shops being open to 6pm at least for some businesses but now given the drop in city centre workers the main late afternoon footfall is schoolkids and now students. Exactly how things look in the future will depend on how many do return to their offices but when it comes to morning trade I think that will be a trend that continues pandemic or not.

This all sprung to mind with the new announcement of people needing to be in work at least a third of the time for the new grants. The problem for those in shops for instance working 35 hours was that when there was talk of only being open five hours a day they would either need to work seven days a week or take a big pay cut. Of course at the time this was not a serious consideration but now, whenever we do reach the new normal. things may be very different.

I know George Street shops told me it was considered the height of laziness to open as late as 10am but it really wouldn’t surprise me if while noon might be a little too late shops consider an 11am start in the future.