A SPORTS shop loved by David Beckham and the Gallagher brothers is on the brink of collapse having been in business for 48 years.
Family-run Euro Sports in Swiss Cottage, North London, has sold football, cricket and golf gear to A-listers including Sir Paul McCartney for nearly half a century.
But the store’s sales have fallen sharply since one-hour parking spots were taken away by Transport for London (TfL) last year, owner Dip Patel claims.
The now 67-year-old has been working in the shop since he was 19 and says TfL has not once responded to their complaints.
The dad-of-two says his business– believed to be London’s oldest independent sports shop – has seen falls in revenue since one-hour parking spaces outside the store on Finchley Road were removed last October.
Mr Patel has sold and serviced the tennis rackets of Londoners, using a specialist machine to adjust balance and tension, for nearly 50 years.
But he says the removal of the one-hour parking spots outside the storefront could force him to shut the doors of the store his dad opened back in 1976.
“We used to have proper parking bays, but the road became a red route back when Ken Livingstone became Mayor,” Mr Patel said.
“People could still park for an hour, do their shopping and go. Ours is an old business. We’ve been here for nearly 50 years.
“People drop off their rackets and pick them up later. But since [last] October, the one-hour slots have been removed.
“Finchley Road is six lanes wide. In the morning, I can understand keeping it as a bus lane. But now it’s a bus lane both sides and customers can’t stop.
“At 10am the bus lanes stop being used – there’s nobody there, so why can’t it be used by shoppers?
“I don’t know what the thinking behind it is. I don’t know who makes these decisions but they are unaccountable. They are paid to do a job and whether it affects businesses, nobody cares.”
Mr Patel added that parking spots to back of shop are residential only, meaning shoppers have nowhere nearby to leave their vehicles.
A Waitrose store on the road boasts its own car park, but Mr Patel says several stores on the road have shut over the years due in part to a lack of parking.
The business owner adds that despite directing frequent complaints to TfL about the taking away of the parking spots since last year, he has so far had no response.
“It has ruined our business to a certain extent, because nobody can drive here,” Mr Patel continued. “We’ve lost business because of this and it’s becoming an increasing problem. We’ve seen a drop in turnover.
“People can’t stop here. We have written to TfL and had absolutely no response. Now what you get here is restaurants. Retailers have been in steady decline.
“It’s not good news for Finchley Road, which was always a buoyant street.
“But these restrictions have really taken their toll on business.
“As long as people are willing to work I want to keep going, but now I am thinking: do we have to shut down because of this?
“Something has to change. I don’t know what to do.”
Why are retailers closing stores?
RETAILERS have been feeling the squeeze since the pandemic, while shoppers are cutting back on spending due to the soaring cost of living crisis.
High energy costs and a move to shopping online after the pandemic are also taking a toll, and many high street shops have struggled to keep going.
However, additional costs have added further pain to an already struggling sector.
The British Retail Consortium has predicted that the Treasury’s hike to employer NICs from April will cost the retail sector £2.3billion.
At the same time, the minimum wage will rise to £12.21 an hour from April, and the minimum wage for people aged 18-20 will rise to £10 an hour, an increase of £1.40.
The Centre for Retail Research (CRR) has also warned that around 17,350 retail sites are expected to shut down this year.
It comes on the back of a tough 2024 when 13,000 shops closed their doors for good, already a 28% increase on the previous year.
Professor Joshua Bamfield, director of the CRR said: “The results for 2024 show that although the outcomes for store closures overall were not as poor as in either 2020 or 2022, they are still disconcerting, with worse set to come in 2025.”
It comes after almost 170,000 retail workers lost their jobs in 2024.
End-of-year figures compiled by the Centre for Retail Research showed the number of job losses spiked amid the collapse of major chains such as Homebase and Ted Baker.
It said its latest analysis showed that a total of 169,395 retail jobs were lost in the 2024 calendar year to date.
This was up 49,990 – an increase of 41.9% – compared with 2023.
It is the highest annual reading since more than 200,000 jobs were lost in 2020 in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced retailers to shut their stores during lockdowns.
The centre said 38 major retailers went into administration in 2024, including household names such as Lloyds Pharmacy, Homebase, The Body Shop, Carpetright and Ted Baker.
Around a third of all retail job losses in 2024, 33% or 55,914 in total, resulted from administrations.
Experts have said small high street shops could face a particularly challenging 2025 because of Budget tax and wage changes.
Professor Bamfield has warned of a bleak outlook for 2025, predicting that as many as 202,000 jobs could be lost in the sector.
“By increasing both the costs of running stores and the costs on each consumer’s household it is highly likely that we will see retail job losses eclipse the height of the pandemic in 2020.”
Mr Patel’s family moved to the UK from Uganda in the early 1970s, when then-Ugandan President Idi Amin ordered all Indians to leave the country within 90 days.
After spotting an advertisement in a local paper, his father got a loan from a friend and rebranded what was then called Lucas Sports as Euro Sports.
Mr Patel’s sister Shilpa, 62, began working at the store on Saturdays and their brother Chan, 71, later joined the business in the early 80s.
The siblings have since made a name for themselves in the capital, providing sports equipment to sports stars including England players David Beckham and Peter Crouch, West Ham goalkeeper Alfonse Areola and members of the Indian national cricket team.
Internationally famous musicians including Beatle Sir Paul McCartney and Liam and Noel Gallagher have also been known to rub shoulders with the likes of comedian Michael McIntyre and actor Damien Lewis in the shop.
Food critic and TV presenter Giles Coren once even labelled Euro Sports as the “only proper sports shop” in the capital.
“The Gallagher brothers used to come in and buy football stuff,” Mr Patel said. “John Barnes‘ dad used to bring him in when he was a kid, Damien Lewis comes in to buy cricket stuff…
“I don’t think there’s an older sports shop in London still run by its [original] owners. There aren’t many other businesses on the road that have remained.
“We have a loyal customer base but it’s becoming more and more difficult. There are people who come from far afield, but a lot of them drive.”
Mr Patel added that when he needed to get some stuff from the shop for his cricket team, he was unable to park his own car outside the shop, as only commercial and emergency vehicles can now stop on the road.
He insists that all he wants is for a representative of TfL to sit down and discuss the issue with him.
“All we want is for somebody from TfL to come down and spend a few hours looking at the street and ask, ‘Does it really warrant taking away all of the parking?’.
“Even one or two spots for 30 minutes would work.”
A TfL spokesperson said: “Improving bus journey times is a key part of our Bus Action Plan to make buses more attractive, encouraging more Londoners to choose sustainable transport options, and helping to reduce overall congestion.
“Bus lanes improve the bus network’s reliability and help to reduce journey times.
“The changes to parking in this location were introduced in 2020 as part of our trial to extend the hours of operation of bus lanes.
“To keep the bus lanes clear, some parking bays affecting the operation of the bus lanes were suspended during the trial.
“There was widespread support for the scheme, and, in 2021 these changes became permanent.
“We regularly meet with local communities, and we would be happy to meet with Mr Patel regarding his comments.”
