A BOURNEMOUTH property adviser has hit back at claims that the rental industry and ‘greedy landlords’ are responsible for the plague of empty shops in the town, blaming instead the massive changes in retailing.

Nick Ellis of Ellis Partners blamed the 15 empty shops that lie within 0.1 miles of the town centre on the shift from ‘bricks to clicks’; the changing behaviour of shoppers.

Referring to the Echo’s original story, which highlighted the empty premises, he said: “This particular part of Old Christchurch Road has a lot of vacancy and this is largely due to the complete change in the base of retail across the country.”

He said the re-basing of rents had seen one property in the area go from being rented out for £55,000 a year nine years ago to £30,000 a year now.

And he slammed comments made by former mayor Cllr Bob Chapman that landlords and estate agents were part of the problem as ‘complete bunkum’.

“First of all, the landlords don’t profit by having the premises empty, they want to get them let, at market rent,” said Mr Ellis. “Similarly, the agents have no benefit in keeping shops empty because we only get paid when we rent them so we want them occupied too.”

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He said the problem was not rents but scarcity of tenants and gave this example. “Russell & Bromley and Jones shoe shops haven’t gone because they couldn’t get a cheap enough shop, it was because the customers weren’t coming in.”

He said the nature of store occupiers had changed along Christchurch Road. “It used to be full of specialist retailers and banks and building societies but those sectors are shrinking - banks are shutting branches, building societies are gone, those occupiers simply don’t’ exist any more.”

He explained there were always ‘deals to be done’ and that his firm was always happy to talk about rental prices to people who wanted to rent premises in the town centre.

“Nobody is going back to the days of the 1950s and 60s high street, I think that Cllr Chapman is possibly looking back with misty eyes,” he said. “You’re not going to get them back again because they don’t exist but if he could show me 15 retailers who want to come into Bournemouth, I’ll do 15 deals.”