Name: Watch as new Boyes store opens in Hartlepool
Uploaded: 2025-11-21T12:28:36.000Z
Duration: 1 min 35 s
Description: Eager customer queued from early in the morning to be the first to see the new-look shop.

Shoppers could not wait to fill their baskets as Boyes opened for business in Hartlepool’s Middleton Grange Shopping Centre.

Customers snaked around the block to get a first look inside the large store as the shutters lifted on Friday morning.

An official ribbon-cutting was performed by the chairman of Boyes, Andrew Boyes, and Hartlepool Borough Council leader Councillor Pamela Hargreaves.

The retailer, which now has 48 branches nationwide, has taken over the prominent unit last occupied by clothes store H&M in 2023.

Boyes chairman Andrew Boyes and Hartlepool council leader Cllr Pamela Hargreaves cut the ribbon on the new Hartlepool store.

placeholder image — Boyes chairman Andrew Boyes and Hartlepool council leader Cllr Pamela Hargreaves cut the ribbon on the new Hartlepool store.

Before that it was memorably home to Marks & Spencer for many years.

Mr Boyes told the Mail he was “delighted” to be opening their first branch in Hartlepool in the business’s 144-year history.

He said: “We used to deliver a lot of products from our Billingham store to this area and have known it was a good busy town.

"Middleton Grange is the place we have always wanted to be. It has just taken time to find the right unit.”

The tills were soon ringing when Boyes opened in Middleton Grange shopping centre on Friday, November 21.

The store stocks thousands of products including home and men’s and women’s clothes, household and electrical goods, craft and hobby, DIY, gardening and leisure, toiletries and Christmas items.

Middleton Grange manager Nik McDonald said it was “amazingly important” to find a new tenant for the large outlet and believes the arrival of Boyes will attract other retailers to the centre, which has seen a number of closures this year including The Entainer and Bodycare.

“It’s a big store and it needed a big anchor tenant,” said Mr McDonald. “To get Boyes with its proud heritage and 84 stores is phenomenal.”

He added: “It’s another store in the Middleton Grange family encourages other retailers to follow suit.

Boyes chairman Andrew Boyes inside the new Hartlepool store.

"We are working all the time behind the scenes.

"But for me it’s about the big town picture of what’s going on with all the regeneration. It’s exciting times.”

Boyes has created around 20 jobs with the new store including some who were made redundant when Bodycare closed in September.

Cllr Hargreaves said: “The symbolism of Boyes coming to the town centre demonstrates that this town is on the up and people like Boyes are coming here because they want to be part of the renaissance and transformation of the town.

"I hope it’s a sign of things to come.”