Colin Whitelaw

The death of some of Scotland’s smaller town high streets has been a lingering and painful affair. The irony is that some of those who bemoan the decline are often on the way to an out-of-town shopping centre.

Realists might wonder if there ever was a Trumpton-style golden age, with cheerful butchers, bakers and candlestick-makers passing the time of day with rosy-cheeked housewives. In fact, many shops of generations past were grubby, over-priced, sparsely and unimaginatively stocked and shut on market days and lunch times.

However, there is no doubt that some smaller towns are in trouble. In the west of Scotland, the retail environment is about to undergo another seismic change when the gargantuan Silverburn shopping centre opens at Pollok in the autumn of next year. The £350 million extravaganza will cover one million square feet. Only the city centres of Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen will be bigger.

Silverburn boasts the largest Tesco in Scotland (140,000 sq ft), the largest out-of-town Marks & Spencer (100,000 sq ft) and the largest ever Next in Scotland (50,000 sq ft). Its impact, particularly on Lanarkshire, Renfrewshire and Ayrshire, is surely of concern to many of those medium and small towns.

Paisley never recovered from the over-supply of space created by the Piazza shopping centre. Braehead was the death knell for comparative shopping not only in Paisley but Johnstone, Renfrew and, to a lesser extent, Greenock.

Recently, Paisley has seen Arnotts, Littlewoods and the Co-op all shut their doors. However, this is as much a reaction to the style of these particular retailers - as closure was a nation wide exercise - as it is a reaction to the level of spend in Paisley itself.

What’s important for Paisley is that there is no future for comparative shopping on this scale. There is too much floor space available, rents have collapsed and this is certainly a town that has to change the nature and purpose of its town centre to offer a different retail experience and attract new customers.

Kilmarnock lost its department store in the mid-eighties. It has a proliferation of small unit shops on its high street, but the opportunity to reconstruct the environment to offer the larger formats that retailers dictate is a huge challenge for the city fathers.

Kilmarnock has the added disadvantage of the M77 extension, which has opened up an escape route for consumers to get quickly to locations that have the retail mix that they seek.

Glasgow city centre and East Kilbride are now 20 only minutes away. Ayr, has fought back with the development of “Ayr Centrale” though, while it has attracted Debenhams, H&M , Next and Primark it has struggled to complete its letting schedule.

This may be a reaction to retailers waiting to see the impact of Silverburn on the Ayrshire coast town. However, I believe Ayr has a strong future if it can adapt further and make access to its town centre more convenient to its local habitants and the greater catchment population.

What these towns all have in common is that UK multi-national retailers want larger boxes with greater access, car parking and mezzanine capabilities to take advantage of economies of scale. If these boxes aren’t in these locations then they won’t come. It’s as simple as that.

However, on Pollok’s doorstep is Newton Mearns shopping centre. Here Marks & Spencers has continued its ambition to expand its store, Next will remain and there are further prospects for expansion with other retailers intimating a desire to be present at this successful centre.

Why? Because Newton Mearns dominates its limited but crucially wealthy location.. It offers accommodation that is in demand from retailers, accessed via good car parking and it has evolved over the years to meet changing demands. Can it remain successful with Silverburn on its door? Only if it adapts accordingly.

There is no doubt that secondary towns and locations can compete if they rise to the challenge.

The Byres Road/Great Western Road area has barely a vacant shop and even Victoria Road and Duke Street have undergone a renaissance. The secret of success for these smaller retail locations is not to try to compete head on with their larger rivals, but to offer consumers something different, something better and something targeted very precisely at a particular sector of the market.

Not only suburbs of large cities have seen success. Towns such as North Berwick, St Andrews, Dingwall and Forfar, buoyed by the tourist market and the emergence of small chains of specialist retailers, along with large multiples seeking to dominate smaller markets have brought about a renaissance.

The large supermarkets have been very active in trying to dominate the small town sector. This is often feared by existing retailers and the proposed Tesco in North Berwick has brought a predictable response from a number of retailers who state they will have to close.

However, in Dingwall the arrival of a larger Tesco actually brought more shoppers into that town and now the likes of New Look, Argos and Lidl have opened there. Customer access - both roads and car parking - are critical in plucking these small towns from mediocrity.

But there remain many towns which are struggling to survive. In West Lothian, Bathgate and the like are suffering badly from the competition that Livingston now offers. It is up to councils to reverse that by looking at the needs of the local population and how retailers can serve that need. In fact, councils should play a more dynamic role in the regeneration of these centres.

Instead of penalising the motorist as a legitimate revenue earner, they should be creating free or low-cost car parking. The important factor for success in any retail location is domination of its market and its sector; and that can be a regional shopping centre, a city centre, a neighbourhood centre, or even a Spar in a village. They all can be successful in their own right.

The UK has many business sectors where operators are either big and corporate or small niche players who over-service their customers. Retailers are learning they are no different.

There are many examples of small niche retail locations which are as successful in their own right as there are big dominant city centre and regional shopping centres. Like so many aspects of business in Britain today, it’s the middle market - and therefore, in retail, the mid-sized towns - which struggle as they offer neither the entire retail experience nor specialist individual choice and quality.

Colin Whitelaw was property director of USC for 15 years before starting Property Investor Partnerships in 2005.