Why this fed-up business owner wants to see the 'negativity' surrounding Mansfield town centre flipped on its head

Increasing numbers of shoppers now prefer to take their business online and trade the face-to-face customer experience for the convenience of making purchases from the comfort of home.

But for Mansfield town centre business owner Katy Bacon the Shop Local slogan is a rallying call that means more than just hollow words.

She has been running The Little Lotion Company inside the town’s Four Seasons Shopping Centre since February 2023 and is passionate about the importance of keeping money within the local community.

“It is really important that people buy local. You should shop local to support your local businesses and local families, that is what we are doing it for at the end of the day - our family,” she said.

"You have to use it or lose it. It's the people of Mansfield that make it what it is. We get a lot of loyal customers who come in for a chat as well as to purchase and it's important to keep that community feel.

“It has gotten a lot harder over the last three years. Everyone is worried about money at the minute. You see all the negative things on the news, people are constantly worrying and being negative online.

“It is hard enough as it is without seeing all the negative posts being made online. It is deflating, because we try our hardest.”

Katy, who is originally from Kirkby but now living in Rainworth, has been trading for just shy of a decade now after turning a kitchen-based hobby of making homemade bath bombs, cosmetics and home fragrance products into a business.

It has seen Katy, who runs the firm with partner Dave Foulstone, make the step up from units in Sutton and Shirebrook to a prime town centre location.

She is now keen to see the narrative changed and for local residents to put the focus on what Mansfield has to offer instead of what it doesn’t.

“We need to show what the town is about and we need to be positive about what there is here now, what there was here in terms of our history and not what there isn’t,” she added.

“A lot of people compare Mansfield to Nottingham. We are not Nottingham. We are not a city, we are a town and people need to remember that. We are not Meadowhall and we are not going to get all the massive brands here unless people start shopping in town. The more people that come into town the more shops we will get in town.

“People are so quick to jump on negative posts and post negative comments, but they are usually people who haven’t been down here for a long time and don’t see any of the positives.

“If you’ve not been down for that long then you don’t know what new shops have opened and you don’t know what is down here.”

The pair initially tested the water with a pop-up shop in 2022 before moving in to the Four Seasons unit.

The Little Lotion Company was named 'Best New Business' during a Mansfield BID awards night in 2023.