The window is the nudge. The door is the point.
Nearly one pub closed every day across the UK in 2025. More than one in eight shops on the British high street stands empty behind its shutters. Here’s why we built this instead of just another map.
Our mission
None of that is inevitable. Behind every one of those numbers is a business that couldn’t hold on against the chains, the apps, and the algorithms that quietly decide where our money goes by default.
Windowshoppers takes its name from something worth bringing back: the pleasure of being stopped mid-stride by a shop window you weren’t expecting — before browsing became something you do alone, on a screen, that goes nowhere. We’ve recreated a little of that magic here. But the site was never meant to be the destination. It’s the nudge. The real thing is still through the door.
✦ Before the chain, before the app, find the window that stops you here — then go and visit. Pop in. Say you found them here. ✦
It costs you nothing, and it can be the difference between a shop staying open and pulling its shutters down for good.
Go window shopping!Where the numbers come from
- UK loses 16,150 pubs since 2000 as closures slow to 350 in 2025, BBPA data shows — Morning Advertiser / BBPA
- Hospitality insolvencies hit 3,353 in 2025 — The Drinks Business, citing UK Government insolvency statistics
- Vacancy Rates by Location: UK Retail and Commercial Property — Clearway, citing Knight Frank Retail Note (Jan 2026)