This is very sad, and everyday you see the traditions of the island disappearing.
Funchal is no exception to this phenomenon, which is reflected in many urban centers. Commercial “gentrification” is the collapse of a city’s traditional commercial activity due to the arrival of businesses targeting a more affluent clientele. Historic shops, grocery stores, and fabric shops are replaced by gourmet shops, international brand stores, and exclusive restaurants, driving out local businesses due to rising rents. A striking example is Rua Fernão de Ornelas, which underwent an acrobatic “somersault,” transforming this thoroughfare and leaving it practically devoid of any trace of its past.
We remember shoe stores, clothing stores, codfish shops, Fiat, BMW, and Mercedes car dealerships, jewelers, photography shops, Oliva, Cayres, Sino, Norte, and Baiana. One merchant told us: it’s our “fate.” We persist. There are no successors to traditional commerce, except in very small numbers. Before, it was the shopping malls that created fierce competition for traditional commerce; today, it is online shopping technology itself that surpasses the malls themselves.
In Fernão de Ornelas today, the local resident is being replaced by tourism. All that traditional commerce, clothing and shoe shops, is giving way to businesses with higher turnover and immediate consumption, such as ice cream parlors and cafes focused on tourism. But this phenomenon arrived as early as 2002, with the change from escudos to euros.
At the time, the practice was to transfer ownership. In Funchal’s history, the biggest deal was Afonso Camacho’s, located in Largo do Chafariz, who transferred his establishment for 80,000 contos at the end of 2001, equivalent to 399,000 euros. The increase in rents in the historic center is stifling small local businesses that cannot compete with large chains.
Last Thursday, the former Biscoito store closed on Rua dos Ferreiros, with its shop windows facing Rua da Queimada de Cima. This store had previously housed the Massimo Dutti women’s clothing store and later the Mike Davis store, a Portuguese casual sportswear brand founded in 1976 in Foz do Douro, Porto. The name is a tribute to a Welsh tennis player.
Funchal Notícias is currently unaware of the business model to be implemented. There’s a trend for “pastel de nata” (custard tarts) that even have outdoor seating areas on pedestrianized streets, or ice cream parlor.