Retail and shopping has been a way of life in the UK, Take away the customer and rents start to drop, and yields start to spiral, with capital values decreasing and towns start to show huge vacancy rates with the town units. The reason for this is multi-leveled, firstly multiple retailing taking away the independent shopkeeper, secondly, the rise of the food retailers the morphing into multi channeled retailers, then Internet retailing will take retailing to another level.
