'Dudley has been turned into a shanty town' - Traders speak out on the impact Merry Hill Shopping Centre has had on the town

Alison Wade recalls the first time she visited Dudley, as a teenager on work experience in 1984.

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"When I first came I thought 'wow, this is lovely', it was all stone, high-street shops, really, really nice.

"Now, it's like a shanty town," says Miss Wade, who has kept the Cards and Gifts 4 You shop in the town for the past 30 years.

Back in 1984 the town had a large Marks & Spencer branch, a similar-sized BHS on the opposite side of the road. A few doors up was Woolworths, and a three-floor Littlewoods, with a popular restaurant, next door to that. Just around the corner was Beatties department store, with the even-more traditional Cook's department store at the top of High Street. Sainsbury's was the main anchor of the Trident Shopping Centre, and the town had three branches of Next. 

And then came the Merry Hill centre. It is 40 years since the massive mall opened two miles away as part of the controversial Dudley Enterprise Zone scheme. Lured by the promise of 10 years' free rates, no land taxes and a relaxed planning regime, the big retailers deserted Dudley in their droves. An independent study found that within the five years since Merry Hill opened, the number of visitors to Dudley town centre had fallen by 70 per cent.

"It was tougher than tough," says Alan Caswell, 73, who spent half a century behind the counter of the Arcade Toyshop at the bottom of the Fountain Arcade. 

"Within about two years, we had to close one of our shops, and get rid of three of our staff," he recalls. "At that time I had two shops, one on either side of the arcade, and a warehouse, but I had to close that as well too. 

"It meant for a time we had to operate from just one unit which was too small really, but I had a mortgage on the house and an overdraft on the shop, so when your back is against the wall, you do what you have to."

Things were even harder for his neighbour Lawrie Fearns, who kept the Castle Sports shop in the arcade. As trade declined, Mr Fearns fell behind with his rates, leading to the humiliation of bailiffs coming to seize his stock. As a parting shot, the distraught shopkeeper painted a message on his windows as he left the property for the last time: "I paid my rates for 30 years, and Dudley Council shut me down. Merry Hill paid no rate for 10 years." Mr Fearns died in tragic circumstances a few years later.

The legacy of that mass exodus continues to linger over Dudley some four decades on, although there is also a mood among many shoppers and shopkeepers that it is time to move on from Merry Hill, and look at what can be done to bring shoppers back.

The damage from Merry Hill had largely been done when Miss Wade opened her first card shop in Dudley in the mid 1990s. 

"It was still a thriving town," she says. "There was still a bustling market, Beatties was still here, you had got River Island and New Look, you had still got some high street stores here, but it's changed again since Covid, since Covid there's been a massive decline, the town's just looking scruffy in places.

"It's gone from being a nice town to getting dirtier and dirtier, and that is down to probably the council."

Opposite Miss Wade's shop is Scent from Dudley, run by Paul Heard, 54, and Julie Burford, 62. They moved to Dudley from West Bromwich five years ago, and said it initially seemed to be a good move.

"It was excellent when we first came here, we moved from West Brom, and we thought it was a really good move, it was really busy, there was a lot of shops when we moved here, Bon Marche was still here, New Look was still here, the first year was fantastic, we thought we had cracked it. As soon as the bus station closed, the Metro started, we noted footfall was declining month by month. Our Christmas sales have fallen considerably, and last year was our worst Christmas ever. Yesterday was our worst trading day ever, we took just £60."

Not everywhere is struggling. Indeed, considering the weather conditions on our visit, John Green butcher's is surprisingly busy, so much so that he doesn't have time to talk to us.

Across the arcade is the Saturday Bookshop, Dudley's last remaining independent bookseller following the closure of Cronin's Books & Bits last year. 

Despite an alarming number of empty shops in the 100-year-old arcade, bookshop owner Francs Sheppard says many of the specialist shops in the Fountain Arcade benefit from a loyal customer base. 

"The butcher, as you can see is very busy, the florist is always very busy, and at the other end of the arcade there is a vape shop that gets very busy," he says.

"It fluctuates, the best trade we get is when people are prepared to travel from Birmingham, from Wolverhampton, even from Oxford. People are prepared to travel because we are an independent bookshop in the West Midlands. We offer a range of books, we offer the experience of browsing in a bookshop, books are curated not purely on the account of their mass saleability, but also on our experience, and people trust our choices."

But he is under no illusions that Dudley has had a very tough time in recent years.

"Everybody knows it has declined," he says. "And it is declined further as they have gone to work on the new bus station."

Paul Goodyear has run the Arcade Cafe for the past 11 years, and like Mr Sheppard, she says trade has held up reasonably well.

"It's been all right, but over the past couple of years it has gone downhill, but Dudley Council aren't helping us at all. We've got the shops shutting left, right and centre and nobody's coming in, but if you go to Stourbridge they are getting help, Dudley town centre seems to be the lost part."

She says the market, in particular, has performed poorly in recent times, not helped by excessive rents. 

"If the market is full in Bilston, why can't it be the same in Dudley?"

She does think it is time to move on from blaming Merry Hill.

"That was 40 years ago, you can't keep on blaming it forever. There are plenty of problems which need addressing at the moment. 

Shopper David Brooks, 76, says the town has changed dramatically during his lifetime.

"The market, the pubs have gone,. a lot of shops shut because they won't pay the rents, the rents are sky high."

Excessive rents is a complaint that gets quoted a lot when shops shut down, as do high rates and parking charges. Both Dudley Council and the Government come in for a lot of criticism, although politicians are rarely popular at the best of times.

The council believes the disruption caused by the much-delayed Metro tram link, and the new bus station, will be worth it when they open this year. Council leader  Councillor Patrick Harley has also hinted that parking charges may also be lifted soon, and hopes to bring an ice rink into the town. 

There is some scepticism among traders though. Mr Heard has his doubts about the benefits of the Metro. 

"You might get a few people come here from Wednesbury to begin with, but when they see there is nothing here, they probably won't come back. It's also a very expensive form of public transport."

Mr Caswell, who spent half a century behind the counter of his toy shop before retiring in 2015, says modern thinking seems to be that turning town centre properties into flats will create a ready market for the remaining businesses. 

He is not convinced. 

"They always say that, but people will go shopping where they want to," he says. "if you build a block of flats with a tram stop outside, they will get on it and go to Merry Hill."

Retired architect Peter True, 72, doesn't mince his words.

"Personally, I would demolish Merry Hill," he says.

Mr True thinks radical action is needed, but questions whether any of the major political parties have the courage to do what is needed. 

"I think we need to look at the rating system, so that the bigger the retailer, the higher the rate of tax that it pays, so that the big companies like Amazon are hit the hardest. We could then reduce the rates for the smaller businesses.

"I feel for the people of Dudley, they're such good-hearted people. But there are some really serious problems, and I don't think they are being listened to."

Fellow shopper Carl Cooper, 69, believes improving policing in the town, and cracking down on anti-social behaviour would be a good start in cleaning up the town. 

"There needs to be a stronger police presence," he says. 

Despite the loss of trade from his shop, Mr Heard still believes town centres are important to many people.

"I'm a passionate believer in the high street, when I buy something I want to see it, I want to feel it, I want to smell it," he says. 

Mr Caswell, who lives in Pattingham, near Wolverhampton, is still a regular shopper in the town.

"Dudley looked after me, and I still love the place," he says.

He passionately believes the town can have a future, but says there needs to be more dialogue. He recalls how in the 1980s and 90s there was an active traders' group, that held regular meetings with the council about how to bring more people into the town. He says there needs to be a concerted effort to get more large and specialist shops into the area.

"It needs something like HMV, look how well vinyl records are doing at the moment," he says.

Despite receiving a £6.7 million revamp in 2015, he says the market is in desperate need of investment. He says if the present operator can't turn around the market's fortunes, the council should bring in a different one. 

Of course every town wants more large and specialist shops, so how is Dudley realistically going to bring them in?

"There needs to be some kind of rate relief, like there was on Merry Hill when it opened," he says.