Are there any shops that have closed in the 21st century that you miss and wish would come back? What are your memories of them?

The big one for me and no doubt many others is Woolworths where I used to get the latest singles and albums - I spent more money on music in there than anywhere else - and used to like looking at the Woolies chart which predicted where singles would land on Sunday. I also bought computer games in there, magazines, pick and mix (of course), ate in the cafe at our local one, and basically bought all of my annual Christmas shopping for people. It was such a versatile shop, and with the right management I do think it could have survived, it just had to adapt better to changing habits which it wasn't great at. A lot of big supermarkets like Tesco Extra essentially became this kind of 'everyman' offering and really hurt the likes of Woolworths but I loved having this sort of shop on the high street, even in very small towns it gave easier access to music and games.

Music and gaming retail was hit so hard generally as I used to love going to town and going to HMV, Woolworths, MVC, Virgin, Our Price, Borders and many more all in the same trip, not to mention Game, Gamestation, Electronics Boutique and others. And now only HMV and some branches of Game even exist still.

Edited yesterday at 15:091 day by gooddelta

Here's some I made mention of in the past, and it does feel sad that they are no longer part of our lives;

Yeah i miss Woolworths and you can always tell the year when someone posts a picture of a record shop display by the cds featured in it

and i see Cher's Believe at No.1 which puts the photo in October 1998.

Edited yesterday at 16:021 day by Mark

I'll have a think about this, maybe Borders. Woolworths was such an essential part of my growing up though.

I've pinpointed that image to late 1998!

True it is - the image is out of date for the thread oops, I guess it’s late November as Corrs’ So Young is there on its first week out.

Try this one from 2005:

Woolworths was hands down my fave shop and I know it's not gone but I'm still devastated that HMV's presence on the high street diminished so much. It's a 90 minute bus journey to go to my closest in Kettering and it's such a small store anyway it feels like it's not worth the visit (but I do when I can!). Also shout out to Virgin Megastore and Our Price too.

Tony Christie and Peter Kay suggests March April 2005

Must be it was a comic relief single.

And the Shaky and T'Pau albums came out of Hit Me Baby One More Time.

Edited yesterday at 18:271 day by Mark

Good old Woolies and its pick n mix ❤️

I was looking through an old phone recently and found pictures of purchases from a store I'd forgotten about, a music and DVD shop called That's Entertainment, under the same company as musicMagpie. I used to pop in there a lot in about 2014 when I was volunteering in a charity shop. I mostly remember going there to fill in 1990s / 2000s gaps in my Now collection at the time, found these pictures:

3 for £5 apparently.

I think their stores closed in the late 2010s.

I remember Virgin Megastores / Zavvi well too. Thankfully my local HMV is still standing!

27 minutes ago, Jade said:

Good old Woolies and its pick n mix ❤️

I was looking through an old phone recently and found pictures of purchases from a store I'd forgotten about, a music and DVD shop called That's Entertainment, under the same company as musicMagpie. I used to pop in there a lot in about 2014 when I was volunteering in a charity shop. I mostly remember going there to fill in 1990s / 2000s gaps in my Now collection at the time, found these pictures:

3 for £5 apparently.

I think their stores closed in the late 2010s.

I remember Virgin Megastores / Zavvi well too. Thankfully my local HMV is still standing!

Yes i remember That's Entertainment, used to visit my nearest branch in Merry Hill, Brierley Hill a lot. Did also fill some collections.

Speaking of old NOWS i bought a lot i needed on CD from HMV when they had a big sale and reduced a load to £4,99

Edited yesterday at 19:191 day by Mark

I only could dream about such huge music shops. In Russia we had very small legal music market (for comparison - sales were less than in Ireland), mostly in cassettes era (1999-2004). Last shop was closed in 2013 year. Britney Jean was the last album, which I bought.

Edited yesterday at 19:241 day by Last Dreamer

I am going to make a massive shoutout to one of my favourite places to visit growing up... Blockbuster Video!

There was just a feeling of excitement and possibility when you walked into a Blockbuster store, not knowing what you would walk out with! It could be the latest bug action movie that just got released, or a cinematic classic waiting to be relived! Video cassettes were replaced with DVDs and later Blu-rays. The time you spent walking up each aisle to see what was in stock was such a nostalgic thing to do that the current generation of online streamers will never know.

I'll always miss Toys R Us, such a shame when it closed. Also really missing Debenhams but that's mainly because of the shortcuts around cities it offered!

I used to work in Debenhams as a supervisor! I didn't care that much for the job but absolutely LOVED the people, the best job I ever had for colleagues and having fun at work (and with those people outside work), so I have a lot of happy memories with that shop and was sad to see it go.

That's Entertainment is a great shout, it was more of a midlands and northern chain as far as I know so wasn't very well known in the south, but I used to use it a lot when I lived in Wrexham and there were several local branches.

For me the lack of anywhere that sells music anywhere close is a shame. I don't always want to just buy from Amazon, and Prime is often a letdown with deliveries too, I'd far rather go to a high street record shop but the nearest HMV is a good 30 min drive.

Fashion chain C&A was huge here until it shut in 2001, almost like a mid-range kind of fashion shop between Primark, M&S and H&M.

Curiously it is still a big deal in mainland Europe, and still has the same logo, I always see it when I'm in Germany.

They had a very popular ad campaign in the 90s there too, with an atmospheric song I sent to BJSC recently.

There was a shop in our guildbourne centre called Wizard which I enjoyed going in when younger.

Blockbuster, MVC, Woolworths are much missed too. In relation to dvd shops .. Tomorrow's World as well was good to check in to here and there.

7 hours ago, awardinary said:

It could be the latest bug action movie that just got released

Sorry but I have to do this....

Maybe even Antz!

A bit of a niche one - Birmingham Airport used to have a viewing gallery (and a shop for memorabilia) at the top of the terminal. I loved going there (even though I visited it about four times) but sadly it closed in 2011.