Reopening date for Nettleham Coop
Nettleham’s Coop foodstore and post office will reopen later this month after the premises suffered major damage in a fire.
The Coop on the village green will be open to community again from 7am on Wednesday October 22.
The fire in April also caused severe damage to two neighbouring shops and a flat above the premises. Substantial work has been needed to get the facilities ready to reopen, including extensive assessments of the level of damage, work to meet current building regulations and structural repairs to the ceilings and roof. To ensure environmental sustainability, contractors carefully recovered and restored equipment and fixtures that could be reused.
Lincolnshire Co-op’s Chief Operating Officer Steve Leach said the project had taken a mammoth effort: “When the fire happened, we pulled together a team of specialists from across our business with the shared aim of getting our valued services back open as soon as possible, but also to support the Nettleham community during the inevitable period of closure,” he said.
“We are at the heart of our local communities, and we knew that many of our customers in Nettleham would struggle without access to a nearby outlet for everyday essentials. Our community team worked with PC Coaches to provide a free shuttle bus to our services in a nearby village, and this was set up within a week of the fire.
“We also immediately started exploring the idea of a pop-up shop too. This took a huge amount of work from our operational and support teams and we were delighted that we were able to open just over a month after the incident.
“Those teams have continued to work together through lots of different challenges to get our food store and post office back open. I’m proud of all the colleagues who have been part of this journey.
“We know this has been disruptive for people in Nettleham and we’d like to thank the community for bearing with us. We look forward to welcoming our customers and members back into our store – we hope they enjoy the new look and what’s on offer.”
Work will continue to take place on the two neighbouring shop units, and it’s hoped both local businesses will be back open later in October. Flowers By Design florist and The Green Turkish Barber are currently trading from nearby units at The Green in the village.
There will also be work taking place on the flat above the premises until the end of the year, so scaffolding will continue to be in place on site as well as restrictions in the store’s car park.
While the store has been closed, Lincolnshire Co-op has run a pop-up shop in the car park and a free shuttle bus service to its facilities in Welton. Both services will come to an end when the store and post office reopen.