Customers are returning to Inverness city centre with confidence
Register for free to read more of the latest local news. It's easy and will only take a moment.
Over the past three years one Inverness gift shop has gone from strength to strength.
Allsorts, which is based in Union Street, has enjoyed two locations in the same street during that time.
Kiernan Mackay – who runs the business together with his dad, Angus, mum, Katrina, and brother, Aaron – said: “We’ve been here for about 18 months. We were further down the road and this is a bigger pitch. We saw it as an opportunity and we went for it.”
He said the business had grown over the years so it had made sense to move to their current location and added: “Obviously this year has been difficult, for the obvious reason, but it has been trending upwards.”
They were able to reopen on July 1 and Mr Mackay said: “We were a couple of days after we were allowed to. To start off with it was very quiet but after a couple of weeks we were starting to see higher footfall – people were confident and starting to get out and about.”
Mr Mackay said they relied on the tourist trade and, since the lockdown restrictions had been eased, they had noticed there were not as many overseas visitors, with the bulk of their customers from the UK. He said: “There was a lot more of that this year than the normal overseas tourists.”
He said people should feel safe in returning to the city centre and added: “They are starting to get the hang of the distancing and how to behave in the shops – it is second nature to put your mask on.
“Almost everyone is being sensible about the whole thing.
“It’s been good and we’ve not had any issues with people doing otherwise.”
