A scheme to lure Christmas shoppers into Caerphilly County Borough’s town centres has been launched by the council.
The local authority has published a voucher booklet featuring more than 100 in-store discounts and offers from retailers in Caerphilly, Blackwood, Bargoed, Risca, Ystrad Mynach, and other areas.
The ‘Choose the High Street’ scheme has been organised by the council’s town centre management team and follows similar campaigns in previous years.
Cllr Ken James, Cabinet Member for Regeneration, was joined recently by pupils from Blackwood Primary School, and Father Christmas, to officially launch the scheme at the Maxime Cinema in Blackwood.
Cllr James said: “The Choose the High Street campaign is all about encouraging people to support their local retailers, and this festive voucher booklet is a great incentive for shoppers to support local businesses and take advantage of some excellent money-saving deals in the run-up to Christmas.
“The deals in the booklet are also a great opportunity for local businesses to showcase themselves and the diversity and range of products on offer on Caerphilly County Borough’s high streets.”
This year, for the first time, the booklets will be available from Morrisons in Bargoed and Caerphilly town and Asda in Blackwood.
The booklets can also be picked up from: Bargoed Library; Blackwood’s Maxime Cinema; Blackwood Miners’ Institute; Tidal Stores in Blackwood; Visit Caerphilly Centre in Caerphilly town; Caerphilly Library; The Malcolm Uphill pub in Caerphilly; Risca Library; and Ystrad Mynach Library.
The offers in the booklet can be used between Monday, November 16 and Thursday, December 31.
Adam Cunard, Managing Director of Picturedrome Cinemas, owners of the Maxime Cinema, said: “We’re delighted to help promote this year’s Choose the High Street Christmas voucher booklet, and we welcome the chance to work with local businesses.
“It’s great to have a supportive local council willing to run initiatives like this which are pro-business and pro-local high streets”.
An electronic version of the Choose the High Street voucher booklet can be downloaded at www.caerphilly.gov.uk.
Why dont they convert the now flattened area in Park Lane right in the centre of the old town into a temorary or permanent car park. The council’s planning department have just about killed that part of town – how about giving something back?
Because that is logical.
CCBC + logic + good ideas + money = disastrous wastage that no one apart from council loonies and their voting sheep support.
Decent council + logic + good ideas + money = UTOPIA!
This scheme appears to be local traders offering discounts to shoppers, so far so good, but, where is the contribution to the scheme from the Caerphilly Council?
It may be a good idea if the Caerphilly Council made ALL town centre civic car parks totally free of charges for the first two or three hours every day in the lead up to Christmas.
Experience of other Towns where civic parking charges have been done away with altogether conclusively proves beyond any doubt that shopping centres benefit from hugely increased footfall, and, recaptures the “Comfortable Shopping Experience” the Caerphilly Council staff work so hard to promote. It is probably the best action the CCBC can take to help promote LOCAL businesses. ( and just at Christmas).
Caerphilly Council couldn’t care less about local business, local producers, or local communities, if they did they wouldn’t have stopped Machen Rural Market – which was a very successful market promoting local food producers from all over Caerphilly, but the miserable lot in Caerphilly Council saw fit to close it down – probably because it was a privately run event set up by volunteers purely for the benefit of the local community, which Caerphilly Council are not interested in.
I would like to see the town’s car parks free of charge, for two hours, all through the year. Cllr. Ed Talbot and I have campaigned for this very thing for more than eight years. The amount of income lost to the council would be small, the positive impact on the town centre would be huge.
The Marks and Spencer food hall in Llanishen turns over close to £300 k per week. The other shops, Mountain Warehouse, Starbucks, Homesense and so on are also doing well. They are a mere three miles from Caerffili town centre. Car parking at the doors of these shops is free for two hours. How well would these shops do if the only parking available was subject to a charge?
We all know that town centre businesses are facing a massive challenge from out of town shopping malls and the internet. Yet people I talk with do like shopping in town centres where shops are smaller and can offer a higher level of personal service. The main reason they don’t is that they can’t park their car anywhere near where they would like to shop.
Unfortunately M&S awaits, Tesco does online delivery, Amazon and Argos sell everything I could possibly need, and St David’s at Cardiff offer parking and a warm, dry environment.
I am sorry, CCBC, but the town centre is not an attractive place to visit. Please, wake up and smell the coffee, the best thing that can be done for the town centre is a controlled decline. Its existence is pointless.
Experiment:
1. When was the last time you went to the town centre for genuine reasons? (not going there for politics, or having a commitment there, but actually deciding to go to the town centre to do shopping)
2. How often do you do online shopping?