Take-away and Restaurant Chains

Is it only me or do others also feel disturbed by all the chains we get in Southwark? We were walking yesterday along Southbank and there is one chain after the other. Around Borough Market there are at least 4 Pret a Manger .

Is there a possibility to stop these chains as they ruin the picture of the city. All the small shops vanish and in the meantime a lot of streets look similar.

I for myself refuse to go to any take-away or restaurant which is a chain as I would like that small business have the chance to stay in the area.

How others see this?

PS. Please ignore my spelling mistakes, I am still fighting with the English writing.

Sidi wrote:

Is it only me or do others also feel disturbed by all the chains we get in Southwark? We were walking yesterday along Southbank and there is one chain after the other. Around Borough Market there are at least 4 Pret a Manger .
Is there a possibility to stop these chains as they ruin the picture of the city. All the small shops vanish and in the meantime a lot of streets look similar.

I for myself refuse to go to any take-away or restaurant which is a chain as I would like that small business have the chance to stay in the area.

How others see this?

PS. Please ignore my spelling mistakes, I am still fighting with the English writing.

And winning I would say Sidi, your spelling looks fine to me, syntax needs a little bit of work, but that will come, there are people that were born and raised here that could probably take lessons from you.

It's our fault for using them, every time we visit Starbucks or Macdonald's, a little piece of England dies.

Me never yuse take out chanes. big up. Respec.

quite like pret
dont like Starbucks ( coffee taste vile)
dont like neros
like some greggs shops but not others
costa doesnt float my boat
banned from mcdonalds ( the missus)

Tom Pepper, thank you I take this as a big compliment. The syntax, well despite the Swissies refusing to have any kind of similarity with the Germans, our writing is the same and this is what you can see in my English writing...

Bigphil, nearly all Sandwiches in Pret have have mayo and I took once (there was nothing else around) a soup which was full of fat, I could not call this healthy..

England has so lovely traditions, it is such a pity but it will get lost like that.

graham wrote:

It's our fault for using them, every time we visit Starbucks or Macdonald's, a little piece of England dies.

Fantastic!

Market forces dictate that chains have a much easier task getting leases etc. Also (as with the vile Tesco Metro fungal spreading disease)they don't especially care about making a profit on each site. More about getting market share, the marketing and pr approach being known etc. (there would be no-one in the land who hasn't seen a Tesco Metro) and with smaller chains that is focussed purely on an ultimate sale, getting their money out from their investment.

So the bottom line is that the smaller independents have a tougher time finding a place, raising the funding and generally keeping head above water as of course everyone tends to go to the 'brand' places they recognise.

I agree with Sue.
we put an offer in on a bar in covent garden.
we know we put the highest bid in and also offered the best rentsl rate while the changeover was happening.

it still went to a larger company, who funnily enough went in the back door to the administrators and completely cut dealing with the sales agent ( still paid her fee though), we found out later that they paid 11k less than us for the lease and offered £250 per week less in rent.

p***d me off a bit at the time.

I'm guessing the administrators saw them as a "moe relaiable" long term tennant and was willing to forego the extra income in the short run. It's an interesting issue since it begs the question how much someone is willing to sacrifice for stability. In addition, chains do go bust too (Coffee Republic for example is no more)...