The owner of three closed Italian takeaways in and adjacent to Cambridge’s Grafton Centre has spoken out about the treatment he received from the centre’s owners. Alex Signorelli says he is on the verge of losing his home and facing bankruptcy after attempting to sell one of his three independent businesses, Signorelli’s Deli on Burleigh Street – a sale he claims was thwarted by the centre’s owners.
The Pioneer Group purchased the center in August 2022. It plans to partially demolish the mall to create new life sciences labs, as well as a hotel and gym.
Alex said decisions by the owners had led to a drop in footfall and businesses becoming indebted. He believes this was a deliberate tactic to drive businesses out of the centre. These decisions included terminating contracts and forcing businesses to close, leaving those that remained struggling with a drop in footfall. In addition, the heating in the centre was not turned on, making it unattractive to customers. In addition, the businesses in the centre were not advertised on social media.
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Alex said: “I kept telling them, ‘I’m struggling to make ends meet. I can’t afford the rent.’
“They said, ‘Don’t worry about the rent. Just do what you can to revive the business.’ They kept telling me to try harder at La Piazza. So I said, ‘Look, I’m going to reinvest – I’m going to reinvest in the staff, I’m going to reinvest in the menu.’
“I wish they had told me from the beginning: Don’t bother. In a few years this place won’t exist anymore, so don’t do it. Instead, they let everyone get into debt without any pressure and then suddenly started demanding the money.
“They cornered us all, and then this new deal came out that said, ‘I’ll tell you what, we’ll waive your arrears if you break your ten-year lease and sign a rolling lease so we can break your lease at any time.'”
Alex compared these deals to “deals with the devil.” Two of his stores, Il Mercato and La Piazza, had to close. However, he continued to pay the business tax for La Piazza because his lease still had years to run.
This exacerbated his financial difficulties and made it impossible for him to continue running Signorelli’s Deli on Burleigh Street. He found a buyer for the deli and asked the Pioneer Group if they would approve the sale, which had to be done in writing.
CambridgeshireLive saw a text message from John O’Shea, Centre Manager at the Grafton Centre, to Alex indicating that “progress” was being made on the permit. Alex was planning to sell Signorelli’s Deli and move to another location in Cambridge.
He continued: “I approached them and said I was going to use the money I made from selling the deli to pay off a lot of my debt. Then I was going to go into my new business and continue with my brand, and everybody wins.
“I said, ‘I’m about to take out a personal guarantee loan that I’ve put my house up for sale. Are you sure you’re going to let me sell it?’
“They said, ‘Yes, of course we’ll let you sell it.’ I spoke to them personally three times.”
Alex took out the loan, but the Pioneer Group never approved the sale, which brought Alex to the brink of losing his home and bankruptcy, he claimed. Signorelli’s Deli closed its doors for the last time in May.
Alex spoke about how the centre’s owners “have caused a decline in visitor numbers”, also describing how they removed the park and ride stop at the centre and did not advertise the businesses involved in Cambridge Restaurant Week at the Grafton Centre, instead advertising restaurants on the other side of the city.
He also said that independent business owners had written letters to the centre’s owners asking them to tell the public that the Grafton was still open despite the fact that so many businesses there had closed, but they had failed to do so.
The last time a Grafton Centre business was mentioned in a post on the centre’s Facebook page was in June 2023.
Alex described how many business owners are afraid to speak their minds while doing business with the centre’s owners. He said he tried to form a traders’ association for the Grafton Centre businesses but was called into a meeting when the owners found out about it.
He claims he was told it was neither in his personal nor his business interest to be part of such a group because the owners could not guarantee him a future in the Grafton. Another trader in the centre, who wished to remain anonymous, said: “They are simply strangling us. They are drowning us.”
“They let the water keep rising without any customers coming and they expect or hope or know that we will have to close at some point because there are so few customers. They just fobbed us off.
“We have invested a lot of money in this business. I have dedicated five years of my life to this shopping center.”
“My biggest crime was trying to promote the Grafton as much as possible – telling people, ‘It’s not as bad as you think.’ I can’t defend it any longer.
“I don’t know how long we can hold out. For years I’ve gone home and told my wife – my girlfriend at the time – I promise you, next year will be better, I promise you, we’ll make it.”
“For years I barely paid my bills because I was still trying to make up for lost clients. I dedicated my life to something I truly believed in. I knew I had a ten-year contract and hoped to renew it. I really believed in it.”
A Pioneer Group spokesman said: “We have great understanding for Mr Signorelli’s situation. The Grafton Centre was already 40 percent vacant when we acquired it and now it is 60 percent.
“Retailers in city centres are also struggling with the current economic situation and people’s changing shopping habits. As owners of the Grafton Centre, we have tried to support struggling local businesses by allowing them to continue trading for a period of time with concessions on lease fees.”
“However, the number of shoppers visiting the Grafton Centre has been declining sharply for many years. Currently, visitor numbers are around 25 percent below pre-pandemic levels. The same economic forces are also impacting local businesses in and around Grafton.
“That’s why we are funding a comprehensive refurbishment of the centre and completely rethinking how it works, which in turn will breathe new life into the local economy.”