Grafton Centre's independent businesses slam owners' alleged attempts to close them down

The owner of three closed Italian food outlets inside and just next to the Grafton Centre in Cambridge has spoken out about the treatment of the centre’s owners. Alex Signorelli says he is about to lose his home and is facing bankruptcy after an attempt to sell one of his three independent businesses, Signorelli’s Deli in Burleigh Street – a sale which, he claims, was thwarted by the owners of the centre.

Pioneer Group bought the centre in August 2022. It plans to partially demolish the shopping centre in order to create new life science laboratories, as well as a hotel and gym.

Alex said decisions made by the owners caused footfall to drop and businesses to run up debts, which he believes has been a purposeful tactic to remove the businesses from the centre. These decisions included terminating contracts and forcing businesses to close, leaving the remaining ones battling with less footfall; not turning the heating on in the centre, making it unattractive to customers; and not promoting the businesses in the centre on social media.

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Alex said: “I kept saying to them: ‘I’m struggling to make ends meet. I can’t afford to pay the rent’.

“They said ‘don’t worry about the rent. Just do what you can to revitalise the business’. They kept telling me to try harder with La Piazza. So I said, look, I’ll reinvest – I’ll reinvest in the staff, I’ll reinvest in the menu.

“I wish they would have told me from the start – don’t bother. In a few years’ time, that place won’t exist so don’t bother. Instead, what they did was let everyone run up debts by not pressuring them and then, all of a sudden, started demanding the money.

“They put all of our backs against the wall and then this new deal came out saying: I tell you what, we’ll waive your arrears if you agree to come out of your ten year lease and sign a rolling lease contract so we can terminate your contract whenever.”

Alex likened these deals to “deals with the devil”. Two of his businesses, Il Mercato and La Piazza, closed. However, he continued paying business rates for La Piazza as he still had years on his lease.

This contributed to his financial difficulties and left him unable to continue running Signorelli’s Deli in Burleigh Street. He found a buyer for the deli and asked Pioneer Group whether they would authorise the sale, which needed to be done in writing.

CambridgeshireLive has seen a text to Alex from John O’Shea, centre manager at the Grafton Centre, suggesting “progress is being made” towards authorisation. Alex planned to sell Signorelli’s Deli and move to another Cambridge site.

He continued: “I approached them and said the money I get from the sale of the deli will pay the debt off, a large chunk of it, then I’ll go to my new shop and carry on with my brand and everyone wins.

“I said: ‘I’m about to take out a personal guarantee loan, through which I have put my house up for grabs. Are you sure you’re going to let me sell it?’

“They said, ‘Yes, of course we’re going to let you sell it’. I spoke to them face to face three times.”

Alex took out the loan but The Pioneer Group never authorised the sale, leading Alex to the brink of losing his home and bankruptcy, he claimed. Signorelli's Deli closed its doors for the last time in May.

Discussing how the centre’s owners “caused footfall to drop”, Alex also described how they removed the ‘park and ride’ stop by the centre and did not advertise any Grafton Centre businesses involved in Cambridge Restaurant Week – but instead promoted restaurants on the other side of the city.

He also said independent business owners wrote letters to the centre’s owners asking them to communicate to the public that the Grafton was still open, despite the fact so many of its businesses had closed, but they did not do this.

The last time a shop in the Grafton Centre was mentioned in a post on the centre’s Facebook page was in June 2023.

Alex described how many business owners are scared to speak out, as they are making deals with the centre’s owners. He said he tried to set up a traders' association for Grafton Centre businesses but was called into a meeting when the owners found out about this.

He claims that he was told it would not be in his personal or business interests to be part of such a group, as the owners could not guarantee him a future in the Grafton if that was the case. Another trader at the centre, who would like to remain anonymous, said: “They’re just strangling us. They’re drowning us.

“They’re letting the water go up and up and up with no customers, expecting or hoping or knowing that we are eventually going to close because of the lack of footfall. They have just wiped their hands of us.

“We invested a load of money in this business. I dedicated five years of my life in this shopping mall.

"My biggest crime has been trying to promote the Grafton as much as possible – trying to say to people ‘It’s not as bad as you think’. I can’t defend it any more.

“I don’t know how long we’re going to last. It’s been years and years of me going home and telling my wife – then girlfriend – I promise you next year’s going to be better, I promise you we’re going to get there.

“It’s been years and years of just about paying for the bills because I’m still trying to make up for the lost footfall, and dedicating my life to something which I really believed in, knowing that I had a ten-year lease and that I was hoping to renew it. I really believed in it.”

A spokesperson for Pioneer Group said: “We are extremely sympathetic to Mr Signorelli’s situation. The Grafton Centre was already 40 percent vacant when we acquired it, and is now 60 percent vacant.

"High street traders have also been struggling in the current economic climate and with changes to the way that people shop. As the owner of the Grafton Centre, we have tried to support struggling local businesses by allowing them to continue trading with concessions to their lease charges for some time.

“However, the number of shoppers visiting the Grafton Centre has been declining sharply for many years, with footfall currently down by approximately 25 percent on pre-pandemic levels. These same economic forces have also impacted the local businesses in and around the Grafton.

"That is why we are funding a major redevelopment of the centre and completely reimagining how it operates, which will in turn breathe new life into the local economy.”