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[BACKGROUND NOISE]
Well, I'm really pleased.
And I'm absolutely delighted, I've made my first purchase.
Mark's bought lots of things.
Well I've bought a pair of Dennis the Menace socks.
[LAUGHTER]
Which will add a degree of excitement to the despatch box.
I've got to thank Mark. It was Mark's idea.
Mark came up with this idea 2 months ago.
And 2 months later and the thing's open.
We live in an age now where it's so easy to start up online
that if we don't make sure our high streets and our town centres
adapt, and adapt quickly, they will be left behind.
And we can't have that because if our town centres start to lose
that sense of a community role, of coming together,
then actually we will lose the heart of the towns and villages.
And so that's why last year we commissioned Mary Portas.
It's why as a government, as a department, we are determined
to make sure that we look at the things that make a difference.
And I can't think of anything better than small businesses
new businesses, coming on to the high street
and mixing with their own existing online operations
in many cases to be able to trade directly with the public.
I think that's absolutely got to be the way forward.
Hi, thank you very much. I'm Clare Lissaman.
With my brother Mark, and another friend Sreeranga,
we co-founded Arthur & Henry just 6 short months ago.
So we're 1 of those 41,000 businesses which started this year.
We do ethical menswear; organic cotton and Fairtrade cotton men's shirts.
And we've just sold 2 to the minister. I can't believe it!
We've only been going for 6 months...
Well we haven't actually sold them...[LAUGHTER]
And none of that would have been possible without PopUp Britain.
It's the most amazing idea for us to be in a shop in central London.
We launched online and I can't quite believe we're here, it's fantastic.
So thank you very much.
So as of today we're writing, as Eric has said,
to landlords across the country, to the British Property Federation,
to encourage and challenge them to do as we have done.
And we can now, both of us, look town hall leaders and landlords in the eye and say
'come on we've done it, you can do this on your high street, in your town centres'.
So I think this is a really great initiative
and I'm keen to hear from the tenants what they're doing.
Thank you to everyone for the initiative so far.
And I'm about to go and pay for my shirts! Thank you.
[NOISE OF SHOPPERS AND BAND PLAYING]