Vanishing newsagents...

raveydavey · Post by **raveydavey** » Sat 28 Jan, 2012 9:03 pm

We already have a thread dedicated to the disappearing pubs of our great city, so what about the seemingly similarly vanishing newsagents?Time was that a newsagent would be up with the lark - open from 5.30am or earlier. Now many have either simply closed or don't open until much later - 7.30am or later.Where does the working man (or woman) buy their paper nowadays?When I first moved to the area I live in, I had a choice of 3 newsagents and a petrol station who were all open at 6am when I left for work. The petrol station and one newsagent have gone completely, whilst the two newsagents don't open until long after I've arrived at work, let alone set off.We started using a newsagent on Barwick Road that opened at 5.30am was always busy - even at that early hour there would be a steady stream of people through the door, not just buying papers, but also cigarette, milk and other bits and bobs. Then they started opening progressively later until you could never be sure if they would be open or not. Eventually the inevitable happened and it was almost never open early, although it would generally be open on an evening as we made our way home.Then this week it was open early again on Monday and Tuesday, although we were unable to stop as we were committed to York Road. On Wednesday morning we pulled in to buy our papers and found it closed again. Sadly it's remained closed whenever we've passed it since - a sign that can't be good.We now have an almost unthinkable situation where there isn't a single place to buy a newspaper on the inbound side of York Road all the way from the Leeds City limits to the city centre.It can't be the supermarkets that are killing the trade - despite having a 24hr Tesco nearby they never have the papers out at 6am, making it a pointless task diverting in.What is it like where you live? Are the newsagents a dying breed there, or is it just East Leeds?

Jogon · Post by **Jogon** » Sat 28 Jan, 2012 9:08 pm

"Vanishing Newsagents" !!!!!!!!!!!!!What about THE INVISIBLE MENDER in Leeds Market? Scary stuff. You couldn't make it up.

Richard A Thackeray · Post by **Richard A Thackeray** » Sun 29 Jan, 2012 3:00 pm

There's one down the road from me that's generally open before 05:00!!I get my 'Yorkshire Post' there on the way to work (when i'm on the bike), & yes, they also have the (allegedly) Evening Post at the same time!!