A TOWN centre food shop has become a victim of the credit crunch and gone into administration.
Sadlers Fine Foods in High Street was placed in administration on Wednesday last week and has been selling off stock and fittings.
Co-owner Frank Hopkinson said: “When the first bank went down followed by a couple more a lot of our customers disap
peared.
“I think they were people that invested and those investments were a big part of their income and they stopped coming in.
“The restaurant was doing well, but it wasn’t enough.
“We feel awful – gutted – but we’ve lost a couple of hundred K personally.”
The shop had been open a year and only a few months ago was highly acclaimed by Gary Rhodes Local Food Heroes, coming in the top 20 for the East Midlands, and was given 40th place in a list of the UK’s top 50 delis in the Independent on Saturday.
Currently Daventry town centre has approximately 153 shops and restaurants, of which seven are charity shops and around 10 are empty units.
Sally Halson, from the Town Centre Partnership, said: “There will be some casualties and we will be sorry to see them go, but we are attracting new businesses in.
“There are units right now that are being fitted out.
“The TCP is about to start a campaign to try and promote Daventry as a place to come and set up your business, and we’re going to be running a campaign to get shops into the town to support the existing businesses.”
