The Association of Convenience Stores has called on the government to help secure the future of the UK's 19,128 rural shops, allowing them to continue to provide essential services like the Post Office for customers that would otherwise be isolated.
The report reveals that rural shops are often the only place where customers in their local area can get essential goods and services. More than half of rural stores (59%) operate entirely on their own, with no other retail/service businesses close by.
Rural stores are at the very heart of the community, with one in five store owners in rural areas having run their store for over 25 years. Rural shop owners also work long hours to serve their local area, with 22% working more than 70 hours per week and 21% taking no holiday at all throughout the year.
The recommendations to Government include:
Producing a dedicated plan to ensure that the Government keeps its manifesto pledge to sustain 3,000 rural post offices. Over the past ten years, there have been over 1,500 Post Office closures in rural areas.
Changing the business rates system so that rural petrol stations can benefit from rural business rate relief, not just small rural convenience stores
Addressing the lack of fast mobile data coverage in rural communities and delivering high speed broadband for rural stores
ACS chief executive James Lowman said: "Rural shops are facing rising costs in many areas of their business, including increases in wage rates for staff, revisions to the business rates valuation that penalise investment, and an uncertain future for the thousands of stores that run post offices in isolated areas. For rural stores, they have to deal with these issues while also being hampered by a lack of fast mobile connectivity and unacceptable broadband capacity."
"The Government must ensure that all rural shops are given the right conditions to be able to trade successfully. Without their local store, thousands of customers in rural areas would have no access to post office services, essential groceries and other services like bill payments."
National Federation of Sub-Postmasters chief executive George Thomson said: "The UK's 3000-strong rural branch network fulfils an essential social and economic role. However these branches are often unprofitable and currently receive a minimum level of public investment. We know there are pressures on the public purse, however the Government must be careful not to be over ambitious in reducing the subsidy. We fear that too large a cut will result in many rural post offices being forced to close."
The report also highlights the important role that community shops play in rural communities. There are now 347 community owned shops in the UK, primarily run by volunteers that have come together to provide a much needed service in isolated areas.
Peter Couchman, chief executive of the Plunkett Foundation said: “All over the UK, increasing numbers of rural communities are turning to the community ownership model to safeguard local services such as shops and post offices. Once in community ownership, these co-operative business are owned and run democratically by local people for the benefit of local people. Plunkett has seen firsthand, how they go on to tackle a wider range of rural issues, from loneliness and isolation, through to the creation of jobs, volunteering and training opportunities and providing a much needed boost to the local supply chain”.
The full report is available at http://bit.ly/RuralShopReport
