Off to the Stores

Herts Advertiser
advertisement 1932

At one time two department stores in St Albans provided its citizens with a wide range of merchandise.  They were Fisk's in High Street, and Green's in Chequer Street.  Neither is extant.  But many shoppers observed that neither trader was a true department store as each had a restricted number of sections.  Nevertheless, if you lived within striking distance of Hatfield Road, you walked to the nearest stop and boarded route 341 or 330 towards St Peter's Street for Fisks (later Blundells, Greens and all of the other city centre shops.

Then, in 1939, something excited householders.  A large store – a new department store – was due to open its doors in Welwyn Garden City.

The first 'Stores' at Bridge Road west, near Guessens Road.

To step back for a moment, Welwyn Garden City (the Second Garden City Company)  had been formed in 1919, and for the next 20 years the company largely concentrated on laying out roads and building houses.  Yet it understood that for potential residents to be attracted to the formative town, shops would have to be provided.  Initially this was in the form of a company shop.  Welwyn Stores (technically incorrect as Welwyn was a separate nearby town) was quick to open near Guessens Road and in a mainly temporary structure.  The first Stores provided most (though not all) domestic requirements for residents.  The company even opened small branch shops on the early estates.  There were, of course, the usual complaints about lack of competition affecting prices, and lack of choice within the premises.

However, all that changed in 1938 when the foundations were laid for a significant new structure on a prime site opposite The Campus (where the original building workmen's huts had been located), and in June 1939 the new Stores, now renamed Welwyn Department Stores, was opened.  Even if you've never heard of that name you will know the business from its current title as part of the John Lewis Partnership.

New Stores opens June 1939.

During the first week of July 1939 special bus services to the Stores were laid on from St Albans.  But it wasn't the best of times for new ventures: in another month World War Two would be declared, emergency wartime trading arrangements would gradually be put into place, and normal bus services would be curtailed.

Gradually, after 1945, when life returned to normal and bus services resumed at or beyond pre-war levels, the route 330 bus was carrying a steady stream of passengers from St Albans to Welwyn Garden City.  Our family was among those passengers.  On reaching the Comet Hotel, we passed The Stone House, picked up passengers from Birchwood, passed Jack Oldings, Stanborough, Lemsford Lane and Valley Road.  The bus travelled around The Campus, and if not going on to the Hospital, the  rather attractively-named destination Welwyn Garden City Cherry Tree was shown at the front of the bus.  The Cherry Tree was a restaurant, pub and music venue.

Post-war bus on 330 route outside
St Albans Bus Garage.
COURTESY MICHAEL ALLEN

Our visits always included some refreshment at the Parkway Restaurant on the first floor of the Stores (now it is The Place to Eat, but the original dance floor is no longer present).  We left the building at The Campus entrance, where the pillars are, and waited outside for the return bus to St Albans.

Clearly Welwyn Department Stores attracted many St Albans people away from the city's shops, and London Transport must have made a good profit, at least for a time, from its route 330.

Well, the two St Albans' department stores, are not part of the trading scene any more, but 'The Stores' in the form of John Lewis certainly is; and so is route 330, though today it starts from St Peter's Street instead of St Albans Bus Garage.  At the other end it finishes at Welwyn Garden City Station, which means Bus Station, which is opposite the former Cherry Tree, which is where Waitress now trades, which is owned by the John Lewis Partnership, which includes 'The Stores'.