Last updated 19:40, Thursday, 08 May 2008

AN ESTABLISHED Maryport clothing store is to shut down because of a massive slump in trade.

Aphrodite owner, Karen Bailey, said that when large retailers such as JJB were closing branches, small shops in Maryport had little chance of survival.

She warned that the long-term viability of the town now depended on the loyalty of local customers.

“We have to get people to shop locally,” she said.

Mrs Bailey and her sister and co-owner, Julie Messenger, said the credit crunch was hitting and they had also closed a shop in Whitehaven, with the loss of three jobs.

Aphrodite, on Senhouse Street, and the sisters’ other Maryport shop, Mission III, operated for eight years.

Their school uniform shop on Crosby Street has also closed down but Mrs Bailey said stock for that would be transferred to Great Expectations, the baby and children’s wear shop in Wood Street.

Mrs Bailey was involved in all the business and regeneration meetings in the town, fighting to see Maryport succeed and grow.

In recent years she combined the two shops and opened the uniform shop in the old Aphrodite site in Crosby Street.

She said the uniform service worked well but not well enough to keep the shops open.

The sisters said trade in Maryport and Whitehaven had been worse than at any time in the past eight years. The women, who both live in Maryport, said they could not afford to carry on.

Aphrodite will continue to trade until stock has been sold - probably in six to eight weeks.

In the meantime the sisters have started a new venture, a domestic cleaning agency.