Why all things Green will be the new UK high street.

The high street, as you know has taken a battering over the past 6 months. We have lost names such as Woolworths, Wittards, Zavvi, Adams and Morgan and don’t be surprised to see more fall before the recession of 2008 is over. These are indeed sad times for those directly associated with these companies either as employees, directors, suppliers, customers or founders. However in reality we must look upon this as an opportunity to create something better.

Yes, we associate these names with our high street, our childhood and much more the nostalgia could be endless, but if we take even a brief look at history the shops that we know and are losing today played absolutely no role in the retail market of 1850, the early 1900’s or even in the 1950’s. Our retail market has a distinct short term life span and we should realise that beyond a small number of exceptions such as Debenhams, House of Fraser, Marks and Spencer and John Lewis who you will notice have a diverse product range and pitch themselves as department stores, our high street is built for a high turnover and will continue to operate that way.

Stores will come and stores will go unless like the above they adapt to change and provide services and products that are diverse enough to weather the bad times of short term product demand slumps and able to take advantage of product demand peaks. The leaders and prime examples of adaptability in recent years are supermarkets. Supermarkets like Tesco, Sainsburys and Asda are fast becoming budget department stores. Although they also have greater history than most stores they have over recent years taken the proverbial baton and ran with it, providing what the people demand when they demand it. Hats off to them for ingenuity.

Now what has this got to do with the new high street being green? After the bust of the early 1990’s the high street facades that were left dull and empty were bolstered by coffee shops and patisseries. Just like then faced with such grim times, we all know that eventually, although appearing highly unlikely at times, that the bad times will end and we will once again find ourselves hiking around shopping centres across the country and surfing internet stores around the planet. So, what will fill the high street facades and online shopping centres? Well we can’t have online coffee houses in a literal sense. Actually not yet, but who knows what the future holds.

But, what will fill the spaces are environmentally and ethically conscious stores. Why so? Because the world demands so.

Our society is an ever growing mass of disapproval pushing everyday towards items that are produced with an environmental forethought and in an ethically respectable manner. The basis of retail in our society supply and demand will prevail as it always does. Customers at present would probably not purchase based upon products environmental or ethical credentials, or if they would they are currently in the minority due to the current economic condition. However in the months and years to come, when the country is lifted from the dull affair with poverty, consumers will begin to think more deeply about their purchases, because all around the constant reminder of our environmental impact and how we can reduce it will be plastered.

I am not a scientist and nor do I claim to understand either side of the argument regarding global warming fully. I am not even sure if the scientists can stay impartial long enough to see each others’ side. Not to forget that 50 years from now scientific and popular opinion could be dramatically changed by further discoveries. However we cannot deny that if we continue to use our planets natural resources at the rate we are currently doing so, coupled with an ever growing population we will in 30 years time look upon a planet that would be distinctly unrecognisable to our grandparents. Unless we wish to live in concrete countries, having no perception of what green fields or clean air feels or looks like, we must make a change to our lifestyle and stop ignoring what is obvious around us. If we take simple steps the picture will be very different. We must reduce packaging and recycle it, we must replenish those natural resources when it is possible to do so, we must support countries that are developing, we must burn less fossil fuels, we must invest in clean energy sources, we must build more eco-homes. Taking simple steps will have a dramatic affect on the landscape that generations of our race will live within.

As with anything in society we are pushed in the direction of populist opinion, thank you for democracy. Although those in industry who currently profit, and profit hugely from non-environmentally friendly industry, will attempt to influence government and society, popular opinion shall prevail. The somewhat disturbing thought to me however is, those who openly and wilfully defy the logic, could benefit widely from adopting greener methods, practices and processes. Perhaps as with all things in our race, they don’t like change as much as the populous would not like to see our planet change for the worse.