Another application for a street food stall has been made, this time for Chiswick High Road outside new restaurant My Place, Blo Bar and Brewers. As bricks and mortar businesses consistently find, street stalls take away much needed trade from them. Cllr Joanna Biddolph objected to this application on behalf of food and drink businesses across Chiswick and her objection is below. The licensing panel hearing will be held on Thursday, 9th November 2023.
Dear Licensing,
I write to object to this application in the strongest terms.
Street stalls have been shown, over and over and over again, to damage bricks and mortar food and drink businesses. This one will do the same. Licensing should not put at risk any of the borough's existing bricks and mortar businesses in Chiswick in favour of a street stall.
There are several significant points.
First, it doesn't matter what the street stall sells, it is providing a meal. People do not eat more meals because there are more places to buy them from; they switch where they buy their meals from which means the other businesses lose custom. So, this stall will take away much-needed business from all and any bricks and mortar food/hospitality business in Chiswick, all of which need customers to sit at their tables and eat their meals to pay for their costs.
Second, we know that existing street stalls have caused significant drops in business at bricks and mortar business significant distances away. Closeness is not the only factor; it is the existence of a street stall that matters. The three stalls further along Chiswick High Road have led to numerous complaints from bricks and mortar cafes/restaurants far along the High Road because they see an immediate and sustained loss of business caused by the street stalls. Licensing must not put even more businesses at risk because by favouring street stalls.
Third, although the above are far more significant, the product is already over-supplied in Chiswick with middle eastern food and specifically falafel available in My Place (immediately behind the potential location), at Megans, Grilandia, Beirut Street Food Kitchen, Lara, West Kebab, Shams, Chateau, Rice Persian Kitchen as well as in wraps and ready-made salads in all our supermarkets who also need customers to buy from them. They include Sainsbury's local a few yards from the proposed location, M&S, Tesco, Waitrose, Boots and the main Sainsbury's. This list might well not be complete; there could be several others.
Fourth, hours of the day deliberately include the peak time for eating and this is precisely when bricks and mortar businesses need customers. However, changing the hours will not help because of the above reasons - whenever bought, it is food eaten that would not be bought in bricks and mortar businesses; there will be an immediate and sustained drop in custom at existing businesses, and there is no shortage of this type of food in Chiswick.
The role of licensing should not be to damage bricks and mortar businesses by introducing yet more unfair competition because the cost of a street stall license is trivial compared with rent, rates, overheads, staffing, etc that bricks and mortar shops have to pay. Bricks and mortar businesses also have to pay for licences for outside tables and chairs, A-boards and other items of publicity.
Licensing should support its existing businesses and refuse this licence.
Councillor Joanna Biddolph, Chiswick Gunnersbury ward
Article in chiswickw4.com: http://www.chiswickw4.com/default.asp?section=info&page=conlicensing016…
