A Marlow shop owner has revealed that ‘parking and business rates’ are impacting his business.

Chris Rose, who owns Gatsby Menswear on West Street, told the Bucks Free Press that due to the lack of parking in the area, customers don’t have enough time to browse through Marlow to see what the town has to offer.

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This comes after the town could get 150 new car park spaces to try and solve Marlow’s ever-growing parking issue.

Chris told the Bucks Free Press: “The car park behind Sainsbury’s is at capacity for most of the time and obviously there’s restricted parking on the street which is for an hour.

“This is OK as it keeps people churning through the town, but if people want to spend a few hours in the town like have lunch or browse through the shops, then it’s tricky.”

Additionally, the owner of Gatsby Menswear, who has had the shop on Marlow’s West Street for nearly decade, disclosed to the BFP that business rates ‘don’t really help’ when trying to make a profit.

The number of customers the shop gets varies on days, but Chris revealed that their busiest days are traditionally Saturday and Sunday.

Chris said: “Rent in Marlow is always a challenge but we’re very lucky to have great landlords who work with us.

But I know a lot of shops on the High Street face challenges with rent, hence why there’s a lot of empty units and pop-ups at the moment.

“This impacts the town overall because the more units there are in the town that are openly trading, more people will come to Marlow and it should benefit everyone.

“Business rates are a challenge for a small business, and with the way that retailing has evolved over the last few years with more and more shopping carried out online, it does feel like it’s not a level playing field.

"Business rates are in effect a land tax, and a typical High Street store pays a disproportionately high tax as a percentage of its revenue versus the big online retailers.

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“Business rates are also a challenge for a small business, and with the way that retailers have evolved over the last few years, more and more shopping has been done online, so it does feel like it’s not a level playing field."

The shop sells a variety of different items such as suits, turtlenecks, shoes, hats, belts, ties and cravats.

Chris them added: “We’ve had to adapt as the menswear market has changed and I think we’ve done that quite successfully.

“We’ve got a loyal customer based who have shopped here for years, they trust us and they like the labels that we carry.”