A store on one of York’s busiest high streets is to close this month – just 20 weeks after it opened.
Gadget retailer Menkind will shut after trading on Sunday, 27 February, a sign in its window says.
The shop opened early in October in the vacant unit once occupied by Dorothy Perkins and Burtons, and then by the Created In York pop-up gallery.
Menkind took 2,610 sq ft of space at the premises – 29-31 Coney Street – which is now owned by property specialist Helmsley Group.
At the time, George Baines, asset manager at Helmsley Group, called the arrival of the shop, alongside American Candy Company nearby on the same street “a brilliant boost for the city centre, with a number of new jobs being created through these openings”.
And Mark Talbot, director at Menkind, said: “We have continued to enjoy positive trading despite the COVID-19 pandemic. This latest store opening in York’s popular Coney Street forms part of our ongoing strategy of selecting high footfall, strong trading locations for our stores.”
We have asked both Helmsley Group and Menkind for a comment.
Coney Street has had a topsy turvy time of it in recent years, with big brands like River Island and Currys moving out.
But more recently it has enjoyed an upturn, with the arrival of The Entertainer toy store, a bubble tea café moving into the former Burgins Perfumery, and plans to turn the long empty Joe’s Kitchen into Rosa’s Thai restaurant.
Helmsley Group has bought a number of properties on Coney Street in the last two years, saying the street is “key to the city’s regeneration and a blueprint for how other areas of York, and beyond, can recover from the ramifications of the pandemic”.