How the types of shops in Stourbridge Change from street to street.

GCSE Geography Project

CONTENTS

Study Area- 2

Study Area

I am doing my survey in the dormitory town of Stourbridge, which is just outside Britain’s second city of Birmingham and is on the edge of an area called the Black Country. Most of the people who live here usually commute into places like Merry Hill or into Birmingham where there are more jobs. The main industry in Stourbridge is its glass works and it is world famous for building the first steam locomotive to run in U.S.A called the Stourbridge Lion.

Introduction

The issue that I am going to be studying is how the types of shops in Stourbridge Change from street to street. This would be a good topic to study because of the different types of shops in the area vary a lot and I can see how the increase of the retail market in the area has attracted different types of shops there. I am conducting my study in Stourbridge town centre, which is the central retail district (CBD) in the area. There are three main streets in the town centre High Street, Talbot Street and Market Street. There is also a main covered shopping centre called the rye market where the main shops are. I am doing Talbot Street and Market Street as one whole street as the lack of data I got from the each street.

Aims

I intend to prove that the groups of shop in Stourbridge town centre are based on where their competitors in the shops field are.

Hypotheses

My hypothesis is that I will find that shop owners when choosing a location for their stores, will take into account the locations of the competitors. Therefore, I expect to discover that shop owners will be attracted to, and their shops will be located on, streets where there are other businesses selling the same genre of merchandise.

Methodology

To collect my data I used a data capture form like the one below. I listed the variety of shops that I could see from a map of the area before I went into the field to collect my data in the forms. To collect the data I went into the town and did a form for each street and the types of shop on the street. I then put them in a table for each street and one table, which showed the whole variety of shops in the CBD. With these details I could then put them in graphs and interpret the data much better. The equipment I used to get this data was a pen and a clipboard.

I have also used a map of the town centre with all the shops labelled on it to get my information data. I have colour coded all the shops according to the type of shop they are and I have recorded the results in a tally chart which I have provided.

I have split the shops in my collection into nine different sections according to the type of shop they are and what they deal in. I have done this because it would be too difficult to do this study under their exact genre of shop:

...

This is a preview of the whole essay

Money

These shops are the shops that are associated with dealing with money. For example they would be banks, building societies, estate Agents and betting offices.

Clothing

These shops are associated with making and selling clothes. For examples they are a dress makers, a child’s clothing store and

Pharmaceuticals

These shops are ones which are associated with beauty and health products. For examples they would be hairdressers, beauty salons and chemists.

Cafes and Pubs

These shops are associated with selling food and drink. For examples these would be pubs, cafes and restaurants.

Electrical

These shops are associated with selling electrical goods. For examples these would be music stores, computer stores and television stores.

Charity Shops

These shops are associated with selling second hand clothing and toys to raise money for charity.

Variety Shops

These shops specialize in more than one thing for example Woolworths is a variety shop because it specializes in more than one product.

Cards and Gifts

These shops are associated with selling gifts and cards. For example these would be a florist, a card shop or a confectionary.

Grocers

These shops are associated with selling food and drink for the home. For example Kwik Save and Farmfoods

Presentation of Data

High Street

The bar chart below shows the amount of shops in the high street area of Stourbridge’s central business district.

Graph 0.1

The pie chart below shows the percentage of the different types of shop in the high street area of Stourbridge’s central business district.

Graph 0.2

On these graphs it shows that there is a high concentration of money, with 9 shops in the area as well as clothing stores, which there are 6 of that type of shop on the high street.

Rye Market

The bar chart below shows the amount of shops in the Rye Market area of Stourbridge’s central business district.

Graph 0.3

The pie chart below shows the percentage of the different types of shop in the Rye Market area of Stourbridge’s central business district.

Graph 0.4

These graphs show a high concentration of mainly grocers and clothing stores in this area both with the same number of shops of 6 o this street this might be because of the influence of other shops o the street.

Market Street and Talbot Street

The graph below show the amount for each type of shop in the Market and Talbot Street area of Stourbridge’s Central Business District.

Graph 0.5

Below shows the different percentages of the different type of shops in the Market and Talbot Street area of Stourbridge’s Central Business District.

Graph 0.6

The result form this area show that there is a clear strong population of Pharmaceutical shops in the area with 31% of the shops in the Market and Talbot Street area of the CBD this maybe because of the amount of other pharmaceutical shops in the area.

Whole of Stourbridge Town Centre

Below is a graph to show the total number of shops in the whole of the Stourbridge’s CBD.

Graph 0.7

Below is a diagram which shows the total percentages of all the shops in Stourbridge’s CBD.

Graph 0.8

The results from the whole of Stourbridge town centre show that there are mainly clothing (19%), pharmaceuticals (16%) and money shops (13%) in the area. But generally the shops have a fairly even spread in terms of amount across the town centre.

Money Shops

The money shops in the CBD are mainly situated in the High street area of Stourbridge with 9 shops there.

Clothing Shops

The clothing shops are fairly evenly spread out over the CBD. It shows that there are a few less shops on Market and Talbot Street though.

Pharmaceuticals Shops

This graph shows that there is mainly a high concentration of Pharmaceutical shops on Market and Talbot Street with 7 shops and the other 2 streets have very similar amounts of that type of shop on it.

Cafes & Pubs

In this graph it shows where the Cafes and Pubs are situated in CBD and it show that they all have amounts very similar to each other and are within one point of each other.

Electrical Shops

In this graph it shows all the electrical shops in Stourbridge’s CBD there are two main concentrations there which are on the High Street and in the Rye Market.

Charity Shops

There are no Charity Shops in the Rye Market but there are a few outside of there on the High Street and on Market and Talbot Street.

Variety Shops

There is mainly a concentration of these shops on the high Street with 4 shops where as there are a few shops on the other two streets.

Cards and Gifts

The results here don’t show any particular strong correlation towards any of the streets.

Grocers

These results show that there is a high concentration of grocer shops in the Rye Market and there are a few of these shops on the High Street but there is none of this type of shop on Market and Talbot Street.

Conclusion

Some of the types of shop that were included in my study went with my prediction for example the money shops had only two other shop off the High Street where as there where nine on the High Street. Another example which proves my hypotheses was correct in some ways is the Pharmaceutical Shops where there is a High concentration of this type of shop on Market and Talbot Street but there other groups of this type of shop on other streets.

Some of my results are fairly inaccurate because of there not been enough data available to prove this for example I was only able to get 6 records of variety shops and card and gift shops.

Evaluation

My field work methods were that I used a map that had all the shops labelled on it and I also went into the CBD of Stourbridge and used data capture forms to record my data down there. To improve this if I was to do this again I would use more accurate methods such as make the groups more personalized to each shop for example I would put the larger supermarkets in there own type of shop for example they would not go in the same type of shop as a smaller independent grocers. The methods that I did use to get the data were in some ways inaccurate because the map I used may have been out of date and new shops may have been set up in the vacant shops that were vacant when I did the survey. Also they are inaccurate because I did not include the vacant shops in the survey.

If I was to do this again I would take my results on a larger scale for example I would take them from a bigger city such as Birmingham or Wolverhampton to get more results to make I a more accurate study. I could also have done a better hypothesis by comparing it with another town of a similar size such as Kidderminster or an area of Birmingham such as Harbourne.

Nick Monaghan