Mason Moore | Hinckley Reporter | 12 July 2020

HINCKLEY’s town centre has seen many retailers try their hand at setting up shop on their high street, with prominent retail locations in Castle Street, Market Place and Regent Street.

Earlier this week, we focused on the past occupants of Hinckley’s indoor shopping complex, the Britannia Shopping Centre.

In February, we focused on the past retailers of the more recently-built outdoor shopping centre, The Crescent.

In this article, we look back on both the big name and independent retailers who tried their hand at operating in the town centre.

Woolworths

Before B&M Bargains made their name known on Hinckley’s high street, their retail space was best known as the space of family favourite British household retailer Woolworths.

Woolworths left Hinckley’s high street after they underwent administration and collapsed as a company back in 2009, which seen their space left vacant.

The earlier record that the Hinckley Free Press could find of B&M taking over the space dates back to 2010, a full year after Woolworths shut their doors and put their shutters down for good.

Co-op

The Co-Operative department store on Castle Street was a rather spacious unit with a lot to offer from beds, to sofas, to an in-house café and even a shoe section.

When the Co-operative left the town of Hinckley, a brand-new independent family-owned furniture store snapped up the unit under the name of ‘Cut Price Suites’ from the Hinckley and Bosworth Borough Council who purchased the space back in 2016.

‘Cut Price Suites’ renamed themselves to their new identity that they are still trading by in the present day, named ‘the Jaspers of Hinckley’.

The new name went into effect from April 2019. The Jaspers of Hinckley space now sports an in-house coffee shop inside named Proppa Coffee.

Savers

Although the timing is a bit blurry and hard to determine online, as there is little to no online presence, British healthy and beauty retailer Savers, once set up shop in the space that is now home to stationery retailer, The Works.

Caves

Local greengrocers, Caves, shut down their Hinckley shop back in October 2019 when they announced their rather sudden closure.

As the time of publication (12 July 2020), the ex-Caves unit on Lower Castle Street currently remains unoccupied and untouched since their closure.

Caves once owned a store over in the neighbouring town of Nuneaton before it became a very short-lived dessert parlour named Jonny Cavello’s Coffee and Desserts.

Pizza Hut Delivery

Back in 2015, a delivery franchise using the licensed and franchised ‘Pizza Hut’ brand name once set up shop delivering pizzas to Hinckley residents, where customers also had the choice to collect.

However, it didn’t operate as a dine-in service like Coventry’s dine-in Pizza Hut restaurants or Nuneaton’s former Abbey Street location.

This marks the only time the only occasion that the British arm of the American-owned pizza chain tried their hand at operating over in Hinckley.

The space now sits vacant after a failed attempt of a chip shop named the ‘Hinckley Mega Chippy’ took over the space, as well as their neighbouring unit of ‘Eat Lean’, which occupied the Ex-KFC space next door at the same time.

Hubbard’s Toy Cupboard

The most recent addition to the list of former town centre occupants is Regent Street’s independently-owned children’s toy retailer, Hubbard’s Toy Cupboard.

Hubbard’s was owned by Caroline Hubbard who had to make the sad and unfortunate announcement that she had finally had to close the doors to the space and announce a last-minute and final closing down sale.

As of this writing, the space is still closed until a new retailer steps foot into the Ex-Hubbard’s unit.