
SEVEN STAFF FACE redundancy early in the New Year after one of Elgin’s most popular toy stores decided to close its doors for good.
The Junners store on South Street will be looking to clear its shelves of up to half a million pounds worth of stock in the run up to Christmas – before finally closing in January.
Junners has been an institution in Moray since 1899 when the business was first created as a bicycle shop in Fochabers. Owners later broadened the scope of the business to Toys – and after moving to Elgin it became the ‘go-to’ place for children throughout the region.
Rumours over the future of the business have been circulating for months, but the news nobody wanted to hear was finally revealed by the store this week through a statement on their Social Media page.
Owner George Duncan said: “After a while of hearing that Junners is going to close I can now verify this as true, we will be closed on Thursday to prepare our store for a Closing Down Sale.
“That will start on Friday with 25% off everything in store. We will be trading up to and through Christmas, so if you have a Christmas Club please don’t panic as we still have your items held in our storeroom and these can be collected as normal or picked up early – and we will apply the 25% discount on collection.
“I would like to say a big thank you to all our customers since the day we first opened our doors way back in 1899, and also a big thank you to all the staff both past and present that made Junners such a joy to be part of.”
The store employs seven people on a full and part-time basis – including store manager Eric Beattie, who has worked with Junners for 34 years.
“This is a sad day for us,” Mr Beattie said, adding: “We have been touched by the support we have had from people who have heard we are closing – we have had messages from as far away as Germany and New Zealand.”
Mr Duncan said that he had struggled with the closure decision but was convinced it was the right thing to do with the centre of Elgin no longer bustling and changes in the toy trade brought about by the increased effect of online shopping.