Today's shopping malls have become a major tourist attraction in their own right, not only selling traditional high street brands, but also housing cinemas and even car showrooms!The UK is home to a multitude of shopping centres, including one which has the biggest branch of Primark on the planet and another which has a 17-screen cinema, attracting thousands of people every week.© suttonbaggies / Adobe Stock Westfield, LondonWestfield, in the London borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, opened in October 2008, at a cost of £1.6 billion. Thanks to a £600 million extension, announced in March 2018, it has overtaken Aviapark in Moscow, Russia, as the biggest shopping mall in the whole of Europe.The expansion increases the size of the centre to 2.6 million square feet. It is opening in stages and includes a new John Lewis department store, spanning over four levels. Other retailers are opening bigger stores in the new area, including Ugg, H&M and Cath Kidston.A new public events space, Westfield Square, surrounded by shops, a dining area and leisure outlets, opened in summer 2018. Westfield has a state-of-the-art, 17-screen Vue Cinema and its own Gymbox fitness club. It has an annual footfall of 27.3 million customers and retail sales of around £996 million. Metrocentre, Gateshead, Tyne and WearThe UK's second-largest shopping mall is the Metrocentre in Gateshead, which boasts more than 370 shops occupying 2.2 million square feet of floor space. Officially called the Intu Metrocentre, it opened on 28th April 1986.It was built on a former industrial site near the Tyne River. Home to three major department stores (House of Fraser, Marks and Spencer and Debenhams), it has numerous fashion brands within the mall. There are also leisure facilities, such as a 12-screen Odeon cinema and the Namco Funscape indoor amusement arcade.In 2015, it was Europe's biggest shopping centre. If you walked past every shop front, you would have covered a distance of 3.5 miles. At peak times, there are up to 9,000 people working there. The centre has an annual footfall of 20 million customers and research shows the average shopping time is two hours and five minutes. Trafford Centre, ManchesterNow called the Intu Trafford Centre, the shopping mall was launched in 1998 and is now the third largest in the UK, with a market value of £1.9 billion. One of its focal points is the spacious food court, The Orient (the largest food court in Europe), which is shaped like a steamship in recognition of the nearby Manchester Ship Canal.The centre attracts more than 35 million visitors each year. It also houses the UK's biggest cinema, where 28,500 visitors watch movies every week. There are more than 11,500 car parking spaces. The total retail area is 185,000 square metres, with an additional 30,193 square metres of leisure and dining facilities. Bluewater, Stone, KentBluewater Shopping Centre is an out-of-town shopping mall, 28.6km from the centre of London. It was launched in March 1999 and occupies an area of 155,700 square metres, making it the UK's fourth largest mall. It is built in a triangular shape and houses 330 retail stores, a 13-screen cinema and 40 restaurants.More than 7,000 employees work there and the mall attracts almost 27 million visitors annually. Bluewater has many popular food outlets under one roof, including KFC, Nando's, Pizza Hut, Harry Ramsden's, McDonald's and a new Giraffe restaurant. It is also home to the Gravity Trampoline Park and a two-storey events venue.Bluewater has one of the latest innovations in shopping malls: a car dealership. Hyundai at Bluewater has generated 260,000 visits - more footfall than the entire 158 Hyundai dealerships across the UK! This proves the brand's theory that the mall premises enable them to tap into a new audience. This builds brand awareness and ultimately attracts new customers. Bullring, BirminghamAlthough Birmingham's mighty shopping mall only comes in at number 12 in terms of its 127,100 square metre floor area, it is notable because it's home to the world's largest Primark store. The Bullring was built in 2003, replacing its predecessor from the 1960s.Despite only coming in at number 12 size-wise, The Bullring is the busiest mall in the UK, with a footfall of 36.5 million visitors annually. It is home to one of the UK's four Selfridges department stores and includes the fourth largest Debenhams in the country.The new Primark opened in The Bullring at the start of April 2019 and has been described as "five floors of shopping heaven".As well as stocking clothing for men, women and children, Primark offers free wi-fi and has a seated area with mobile phone chargers. Customers can also dine in the Disney café and play in the game zone, while there's a dedicated Disney area full of clothes, toys and accessories.Commercial Aluminium Shopfronts (CAS) supplies and installs high-quality shopfronts that are ideal for shopping malls. Please contact us for details of our products and services – go on, give us a call, we'd love to talk to you!

Written by the legendary John Sullivan, Only Fools and Horses is one of the best-loved British TV series of all time. First broadcast on BBC1 in 1981, it ran for 10 years, becoming the most watched television programme in history. It also returned for several Christmas specials until 2003.Played by David Jason, Derek "Del Boy" Trotter always has some money-making scheme up his sleeve. Sadly, most of them go horribly wrong and often end up costing him money!Del Boy's younger brother, Rodney, played by Nicholas Lyndhurst, is the more cautious and sensible sibling, who is swept along with Del Boy's crazy schemes, often against his better judgement.The rest of the Trotter clan, including Grandad (Lennard Pearce) and Uncle Albert (Buster Merryfield), plus a host of other memorable Peckham characters, were much loved by the Great British public.In fact, more than 24 million people tuned into the 1996 Christmas special, when Del Boy and Rodney finally came into money when they sold a rare antique clock at auction. Reliant RegalThe Trotter brothers were famous for their battered old three-wheeler van, the yellow Reliant Regal with "Trotters Independent Traders" emblazoned on the side - T.I.T. for short!  Although it looked like it was on its last legs, the van had a surprising and unexpected turn of speed, featuring in some of the funniest episodes of the series.In one episode, Rodney goes on a date with Nerys, the barmaid at the Nag's Head. He hears that she prefers macho men, so to impress her, he wears a leather jacket and acts tough, as he tears through the streets with Status Quo blasting out.Unfortunately, the hapless Rodders is later chased by a gang of angry youths in a sports car. The ensuing high-speed chase sees Rodney racing past two police officers at temporary traffic lights, when his three-wheeler goes flying through the air at the brow of a hill and almost knocks down a number of pedestrians!Rodney is no boy racer and he screams blue murder throughout the whole chase, as the Reliant Regal swerves all over the road and pavement.The trusty car was a very important part of the series, since it was used to transport all the dodgy goods which Del Boy and Rodney were selling on the market. It carried everything from exploding blow-up dolls to barking toy dogs that fell out of the back door and bounced around the road, with the police in hot pursuit. Mark II CortinaIn another episode, Rodney buys an old Mark II Cortina, which turns out to be a death trap… with no brakes! After careering down the road, barely able to stop, Rodney tries to sell his car (which he bought for £25) for £199 to make a serious profit!Ironically, after Rodney and Del sell the dodgy Cortina to an abrupt Australian who doesn't like "Cockneys" and thinks they are out to con him, the Trotters actually crash into it later on, when they are driving their friend Boycie's E-Type Jaguar!Boycie had asked Del to look after his car for a week, so the Trotter brothers went out on the town and managed to get some girls' phone numbers. When Rodney accidentally throws the numbers out of the car window, mistaking them for rubbish, Del does an emergency stop and has the accident with Rodney's former Cortina! Capri GhiaCars in general play a major role in Only Fools and Horses, with the leading characters usually experiencing various disasters in them.There were also some poignant moments, including when Del and Rodney drove to Uncle Albert's funeral in a Ford Capri Ghia - the crème de la crème of Capris.Rodney wasn't a big fan of the car and nicknamed it the "pratmobile", in reference to the rather more desirable Batmobile. It had tiger-print faux fur seats, six extra fog lamps and pink aerials. As if that wasn’t naff enough, it was painted lurid bright green!With some rather special pronunciation, Del Boy called it his "Capri Gear", rather than "Ghia". The Capri became almost as iconic as the Reliant Regal over time. Luxury carsBoycie, played by John Challis, was a used car salesman, who had a showroom full of some classic, and some not so classic cars. His own E-Type Jaguar was his pride and joy, until Del crashed it!In fact, Boycie’s car showroom played an integral role in the most exciting plot of Only Fools and Horses, when Del and Rodney became multi-millionaires after their famous antique clock sale netted them a fortune.Del went to look at his dream car, a Rolls-Royce, but couldn't believe he had come into money and was almost too scared to buy it. Meanwhile, Rodney went into Boycie's office at the showroom and told him they wanted to buy the Rolls-Royce.Boycie was very smug, not knowing the Trotters had come into money, so he laughed at Rodney and asked if he was on drugs - until Rodney pulled a letter out of his pocket confirming they had sold a Harrison Lesser timepiece for £6.2 million at auction!Finally, in a very poignant moment, Rodney buys the Rolls-Royce for Del and hands him the keys and the brothers hug warmly. This scene proved how wonderful Only Fools and Horses was, with its unique knack of mixing comedy with genuine emotion… a sure-fire winner with the audience. Bidding warsIn 2016, Boycie's 1973 Jaguar from the show sold for £115,000 at auction. It had been expected to fetch £85,000 at Blenheim Palace, but went for much more. The "old English white" Jaguar E-Type Series III was sold by a Swansea businessman, although the buyer's details weren't made public.In 2017, Del Boy's yellow 1968 Reliant Regal van sold for almost £42,000 at auction. After the series ended, it had been bought by someone described as a "superfan", who finally sold it at Silverstone Auctions of Warwickshire. The estimate for the van had been £20,000, but a bidding war resulted in the price doubling.Commercial Aluminium Shopfronts (CAS) supplies and installs shopfronts that are suitable for car showrooms. Give your premises a contemporary and welcoming feel with one of our high-quality exteriors.Please contact us for details of our products and services - we'd love to talk to you!

Britain's florists are preparing for one of the busiest times of year. To celebrate Valentine's Day, a staggering £262 million is spent on flowers for loved ones.It's important to look for the perfect gift for the big day and saying it with flowers is something that 75% of British men will be doing on 14th February.Symbolising love, romance and passion, red roses are the most popular Valentine’s flower - around 43% of the flowers sold are red roses, usually in bunches of 12 cut stems.This means that 57% of customers are looking for something different - other Valentine's Day contenders include anemones, camellia, freesia, lilies, daisies, tulips and carnations, to name but a few.© asife / Adobe Stock Booming industryThe cut flower industry in the UK is worth around £2 billion annually. Special occasions such as Valentine's Day, Mother's Day and Christmas are the main times when thousands of orders are guaranteed.For the florists vying for supremacy, it's a case of buying in additional items that can complement the flowers. This makes it convenient for customers to buy the perfect flowers and also another gift, all under one roof - such as a decorative vase, a box of chocolates, a teddy or a silk heart.High-street florists have diversified their range of products to keep pace with the times and fend off stiff competition from online retailers. History of floristryThe earliest records of flower-arranging as an art date back to the Ancient Egyptians in 2,500 BC. They would place cut flowers in vases and create highly stylised arrangements as table decorations and for occasions such as processions.Illustrations of intricate Ancient Egyptian flower arrangements have been found painted on walls and carved in stone.During the Ancient Greek period, dating from 600 BC to 150 BC, floristry provided decorations for the home and even for clothing, with herbs added to further enhance the displays.Floristry became popular in Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries, the delicate arrangements contrasting with the symmetrical Baroque architecture of France, which was the first European country to embrace floral exhibits from around 1610.In the United States, during the colonial era, flowers and herbs were first grown for medicinal purposes and floral decorations in the home were simple. In the UK, floral arrangements grew in popularity during the Victorian era, when they became more lavish.Roses became popular, as did dahlias, tulips, lilies and fuchsias. This was the first era when floristry began to develop as an industry and particular styles of flower arranging started to take shape. Window displaysToday, florists offer many services and they can even make sure your Valentine's gift is personalised for that special someone. Retailers will use flowers to promote their window displays, especially near Valentine’s day.Floral displays create a huge visual appeal and those with stunning window displays, close to a main shopping area, will be assured of brisk business.Many new floristry businesses begin on a market stall, or in small premises close to a main transport link, such as a busy commuter line, or a bus station. This gives them a steady flow of passing trade and it means they can build up their business and income over time, before investing in larger premises. Shift to "buy British"This Valentine's Day, an estimated 90% of the cut flowers will be imported from overseas, according to surveys. This is because the winter's weather in the UK isn't conducive to producing the volume of flowers that will be required to cope with the demand.However, there's a growing trend among British florists to buy more local blooms. Organisations such as The British Flower Collective and Flowers From the Farm are helping to coordinate the efforts to buy British.They say the advantage is that local flowers stay fresher for longer, as the transportation time is reduced. International flowers can take more than a week to arrive after being cut. Popular Valentine's flowersThe average price of a bunch of 12 red roses this Valentine's Day will be around £32 and an additional 250 million extra roses will be grown just for the special day.Of the roses bought by men for their loved one, 43% will be red. Other colours are also popular, with pink roses symbolising grace, yellow roses meaning friendship and white roses suggesting beauty and innocence.Red tulips represent true love, while pink carnations are sent to someone you'll never forget, and lavender signifies devotion.Research has shown that a massive 95% of customers will be more likely to go into a shop if it has an attractive exterior, so it's important that florists get their Valentine's window display on point. If the exterior looks uninviting, 52% of customers say they would be less likely to cross the threshold.Ensure your premises look their best by contacting Commercial Aluminium Shopfronts (CAS) and enquiring about our specialist services. We represent expertise, high quality, value for money and excellent customer service and after-sales care.For retail premises that stand out from the crowd, contact our friendly and knowledgeable advisors for further details of our range of products and services.