Recovery Road

Introduction

Welcome to Recovery Road. This is a high street with a difference. Much has been written about the British high street over the past decade; the majority of it documenting shop closures, decline of town centres and job losses in the retail sector. 

In spite of this there is cause for some optimism. In the past three years there have been four retail categories which have shown remarkable growth. In the years 2016 to 2018 barbers, beauty salons, vape stores, and restaurants have been the fastest growing retail sectors. These retailers have consistently experienced the highest number of net store openings according to data from the Local Data Company. 

Recovery Road investigates these retail categories in greater detail to begin to understand why they have taken a foothold despite the difficult climate. In this interactive guide we show that these fast-growing categories demonstrate British retail and the high street has the potential to evolve with independent business at the helm. The remaining slides of Recovery Road take a step back in time and look at the retail brands which are no longer on the British High Street, have been taken over, moved online or digitally evolved between the 2008 financial crisis and the end of 2018.