After 77 years trading, a well known York shop has brought down the shutters for the final time.
Family-run jeweller RA Braithwaite, a part of the city’s retailing scene since 1946, has closed its Goodramgate shop.
Owners Dianne and Frank Wood have decided it is time to move on from high street retailing, and have sold the freehold premises.
It closes a chapter that began when Joyce and Reginald Arthur Braithwaite opened their jewellery business in 1946 in York.
Their daughter Dianne, together with husband Frank, took over in 1995.
Now though they have decided to semi-retire – they will still run the RA Braithwaite online shop.
And as running the Goodramgate shop did not appeal to the next generation of the family, the couple put it up for sale.
It caught the eye of Caroline Foster, the owner of another long-established city centre jewellers, Fosters in High Petergate.
She took over that business, which was started by her late father, Tim Foster, a well-known local businessman, back in 1981.
Caroline has bought Braithwaites – and although the name above the door will change, the sale of jewellery is set to continue from a prime retail location for many years to come.
Business for Fosters continues unchanged in the short term from their High Petergate premises while rebranding gets underway at 83 Goodramgate. The new shop opens on Monday 17 July.
Selling agent, Andrew Hedley of Blacks Property Consultants in York, said that he was delighted with the deal which, importantly for the city, sees Goodramgate’s continued appeal to privately owned, traditional high street businesses, strengthening particularly in the past 12 months.
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