Harrogate’s first Lidl set to open this autumn

Harrogate’s first Lidl supermarket is set to open this autumn, the company has confirmed.

Work began in February to demolish the old Lookers car dealership on Knaresborough Road to make way for the new store.

It will be the first Lidl to open in Harrogate, although there is already one in Knaresborough.

The multi-million-pound building includes a 1,263 square metre sales area, an in-store bakery, customer toilets and 94 parking spaces.

The new store will be open from 8am to 10pm Monday to Saturday and 10am to 4pm on Sunday.

The German-owned company is currently on a recruitment drive for staff. A Lidl spokesperson said:

“We are delighted to confirm that construction of our new Lidl store on Knaresborough Road, Harrogate is well underway.

“The store is due to open this autumn and we are currently hiring for open vacancies, so would encourage anyone interested to visit our careers website.

“We look forward to sharing more information with the local community closer to the time.”

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The quirky new Harrogate café where customers can cuddle chihuahuas

A quirky café where you can grab a slice of cake and cuddle a chihuahua is set to open in Harrogate this month.

Billed as ‘England’s first interactive chihuahua experience’, The Chihuahua Lounge is aimed at boosting mental health with pet assisted therapy.

The venue, on Knaresborough Road, is expected to open on weekends from Saturday, May 14.

Customers will be able to book a 50-minute session at the café, on Knaresborough Road, and chill out with a coffee in the company of six cute long-haired chihuahuas.

Picnic and her puppies Badger, Lambie, Potter, Peony and Lucy, all bred and raised by café founder Caroline Leather, will roam free within the building.

Ms Leather said she wanted to share the benefits that she gains from her own affectionate pack of chihuahuas.

She explained that this is how the concept of a ‘home-from-home interactive chihuahua experience’ with lounge seating, coffee, cakes and cuddles was born.

Ms Leather said:

“The Chihuahua Lounge is a friendly, safe haven, away from the hustle and bustle of modern life.

“We are passionate about animal assisted therapy, which has shown that spending time with dogs not only reduces your heart rate and blood pressure, but is good for mental health.

“We offer an extensive menu of hot and cold drinks, freshly baked cakes and have cosy sofas, arm chairs and foot stools, so you can kick off your shoes and curl up for a cuddle.”

The experience costs £10 per person. This contributes towards the cost of the specific qualifications needed to exhibit the animals, as well as the strict animal welfare and licensing laws.

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For the safety of the dogs, only children over the age of six are permitted.

Ms Leather said:

“Our dogs love human attention and we have made sure that the café is a home-from-home for them.

“They also have their own private room where they are free to wander in and out as they please.

“We do not force our dogs to be in the lounge area with our guests. When the dogs are in the lounge space, they are there out of choice, and we intend to always keep it that way.

Ms Leather explained that the dogs also have weekly health checks and  behavioural studies are conducted on each animal regularly to ensure their behaviour in the café demonstrates that of a happy and relaxed dog.

She added:

“If it does not, we take them out of the café environment.

“We have a set of house rules to protect the dogs welfare that have to be adhered to by all customers.

“We also limit the capacity of our café to ensure the dogs are not overcrowded.”

Harrogate residents hope badgers will thwart housing scheme

Members of the Kingsley Ward Action Group (KWAG) hope the discovery of badgers will thwart a proposed housing development on Kingsley Road.

Redrow Homes won outline planning permission to build 133 homes on appeal in August 2020 after it was initially refused by councillors on Harrogate Borough Council’s planning committee.

A reserved matters application that gives a final rubber-stamp to development is yet to be signed off.

As part of the application, the developer submitted two ecology studies.

These found there were four badger setts in the area but only one or two were still actively used by the animal.

Members of KWAG bought a trail cam, which is a camera that is left outside and captures the movement of animals.

They claim their investigation found evidence of 11 badger setts, 6 of which it says are still active.

Mr Tremble said:

“How can complete amateurs spot this much badger activity so easily when so-called professionals failed completely?”.

KWAG has sent the results of their investigation to HBC councillors.

 

How the proposed development will look

Badgers and their setts are protected by law.

Developers must have a licence from Natural England to remove or modify a badger sett.

John Hansard from KWAG said the planning application must now be put on hold until the licence is approved, which could take months.

He said:

“There is proof of badgers on site. It’s the breeding season now so they can’t apply for a licence until the end of June. Nothing can happen until then.”

Redrow’s response

Traci Moore, land and planning director for Redrow (Yorkshire), said:

“We are committed to protecting wildlife in and around the proposed development. We have undertaken surveys of local wildlife and submitted ecological reports in line with the outline planning permission, including a detailed badger survey in 2021.

“We have also submitted proposals to reduce the impact of the development on the native badger population. These proposals are subject to ongoing discussion and agreement with the council’s ecologist.”

Harrogate pharmacy customers face long queues outdoors

Queues of up to 20 people waiting for up to an hour to be served have been reported outside a Harrogate pharmacy.

Several residents have contacted the Stray Ferret to complain about regular queues at Lloyds Pharmacy on Knaresborough Road over the last three weeks.

Signs in the pharmacy window say a new dispensary system and lack of staff is creating additional workload.

One resident, Brian Souter, said he gave up after queueing for 30 minutes when there were still eight people in front of him.

He said there were about 20 people queueing, including older people, and said the company needed to ensure the pharmacy had enough staff.

“I can’t stand for very long so I had to leave after 30 minutes. They were doing two in at a time.

“I rang head office to complain about a week ago, it’s not down to the staff inside, they can only do what they can with a few staff. Head office need to come and help.”

A sign outside the pharmacy.

Other residents have also contacted the Stray Ferret to say they endured long queues of between 15 minutes and an hour for prescriptions.

One resident, who lives close by but asked not to be named, said the pharmacy was usually “very efficient” but long queues had become the norm. He said:

“A lot of people are elderly or infirm and to have them waiting outside for up to an hour is ridiculous.”

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A spokesperson for Lloyds Pharmacy said:

“It is always our priority to ensure our patients, customers and colleagues are safe and that all our pharmacies are open and accessible.

“Recruiting new pharmacists became more challenging during the pandemic, and this continues to be the case. We have an action plan in place to address staffing issues.

“In addition, a software issue that caused our dispensary system to run more slowly than normal impacted this pharmacy, causing some delays for the pharmacy team and its customers and patients over the weekend.

“A resolution was swiftly identified and quickly deployed to return the system to normal dispensing speeds.”

Plans approved to convert Harrogate bookmakers into chicken restaurant

Plans have been approved to convert a former Coral bookmakers in Harrogate into a piri-piri chicken restaurant and takeaway.

Harrogate Borough Council has given the go-ahead to the plan, which was submitted by Foodie Zone Ltd, to convert the betting shop on Knaresborough Road.

Planning documents submitted to the authority indicate that the restaurant would open as part of the franchise Pepe’s Piri Piri, which has 132 restaurants in the country including in Leeds, Bradford and Huddersfield.

The restaurant specialises in frame-grilled chicken. According to the proposal, 15 full time jobs will be created as part of the proposal.

Documents say the restaurant would provide family-friendly ‘healthy grilled food’. They add:

“The proposed restaurant will provide a family-friendly dining experience with family seating areas, providing healthy grilled food, as part of the new healthy style of living, something which is limited in the area and would be very successful.”

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Knaresborough Road betting shop could become piri-piri chicken restaurant

Plans have been submitted to convert the former Coral bookmakers on Knaresborough Road in Harrogate into a piri-piri chicken restaurant.

Planning documents indicate the restaurant would open as part of the franchise Pepe’s Piri Piri, which has 132 restaurants in the country including in Leeds, Bradford and Huddersfield.

The chain specialises in flame-grilled fried chicken.

The company Foodie Zone Ltd applied to Harrogate Borough Council last week to open the restaurant. The application said it would create 15 full-time jobs.

Documents say the restaurant would provide family-friendly ‘healthy grilled food’. They add:

“The proposed restaurant will provide a family-friendly dining experience with family seating areas, providing healthy grilled food, as part of the new healthy style of living, something which is limited in the area and would be very successful.”

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Business moves to independence despite covid challenges

Two business partners have taken the next step in their future plans, despite the challenges of coronarivus.

Kevin Masheder and Marc Squires have owned the Harrogate franchise of Signarama since 2016 and, like most business owners, have faced the challenges of changing regulations since last March.

They have now decided to launch as an independent signage business under a new brand, SignHub, and hope the contacts they have built over the last five years will see them through the rest of lockdown and beyond. Marc said:

“When the first lockdown was announced, we closed for seven or eight weeks, when the shops were all closed. They started saying manufacturing could be open as an essential service, but it was all very uncertain.

“When retail opened, Kevin and I came in, then the other staff followed on part-time furlough. After we opened, we had a lot of work from people like landscape gardeners, who could work outside.”

The second half of 2020 was a mixed picture for the business, with quieter periods during tighter restrictions and over Christmas. The new lockdown from the start of the year saw work tail off, but Marc said the last two weeks have been busier again – and the pair are hopeful that the next stage in their business journey will be a success, despite the challenging circumstances.

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Initially employed as graphic designers, when Marc and Kevin took over the franchise they were given the opportunity to turn it into an independent business. However, they wanted to learn the ropes from outgoing owner Michael Webster, who stayed on to help them get established before taking full retirement.

With a host of local companies using their services to create signage and more, the pair hope the rebrand will only help to raise their profile. Customers have already been complimenting the new signs on their Knaresborough Road premises – but they won’t be in place for long.

The lease on the building ends this spring so, needing more space and covered areas to brand vehicles, they are moving to Killinghall Business Park. Marc added:

“When we could network, we got to know a lot of people in the business community. We thought if we can spread the word about the changes, it won’t be too bad.

“We are roadside now, so people do come past, but they only come in if they need what we offer – and at the moment, the retail side is click and collect only. A lot of our work comes from online, especially since covid began, and a lot of our bigger customers wouldn’t come to the shop anyway – they just email or pick up the phone.

“We also get a lot of referrals from our customers, so we hope that will continue.”

Lidl plans to open first Harrogate store

German supermarket chain Lidl has unveiled plans to open a new store on the site of the former Lookers car showroom on Knaresborough Road in Harrogate.

The company has yet to submit a formal planning application but has opened a public consultation for the store, which they say will create about 40 jobs.

The 1,263 sq metre supermarket would have an in-store bakery and 94 car parking spaces.

It would open from 8am to 10pm Monday to Saturday and 10am to 4pm on Sunday.

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Lidl’s regional property director, Robert Beaumont, said:

“We have been looking forward to bringing a new store to Harrogate for a while and the former Lookers site is a great location.

“We are extremely excited about the prospect of opening our first Lidl in the area and serving our fresh, quality and incredibly good value produce to the local community.”

Lidl entered the UK market in 1994 and now has over 800 stores across the country, including one in Knaresborough.