I was sent to a town in Staffordshire to take a look at its shopping centre, which was considered worthless by its leasehold owner. I took a walk around the town centre, which was undergoing major changes and, as a consequence, much of it looked like a building site. But there was one place in the town that came to life.
Packed out on a dreary pre-Christmas Wednesday evening with happy faces. Full of chatter and supping a variety of drinks that won’t be found elsewhere. The Tamworth Tap sits in Market Street in the heart of the town it’s named after.
It’s a stone’s throw from the statue of Robert Peel, twice the country’s Prime Minister and famed for founding modern policing – most particularly those Bobbies which we always want more of on the beat. Read more: Two West Midlands pubs named among the best in the country Tamworth is a town I worked in for more than a decade. At the offices of the Tamworth Herald on the edge of the Ventura Retail Park.
I would venture into the town centre often with my friend and colleague Dan, who’d buy a jacket potato from Spudman before he became a TikTok sensation with queues around St Editha’s Square (before his ‘temporary’ move to Coleshill). I was asked to visit the Ankerside Shopping Centre – given away for free by its leaseholder owners REI Nederland BV back to Tamworth Borough Council at the end of November to check it out. You can read my shopping centre thoughts here and the thoughts of locals – who both cheris.