FOR all their convenience, chain stores offer a similar experience. That’s the whole point. So it is often a pleasure to visit an old-fashioned shop where old-fashioned values still count. Sadly they are few and far between, these days, and now we are about to lose another.

Leather specialist Robson & Cooper, in York will close its doors next Saturday, following the death of its co-owner, and it will be missed by many. In its 170 years, the firm won best display at the Great Exhibition of 1851, while customers included royalty, members of the Rothschild family and Great War cavalry regiments.

Robson & Cooper was one of a kind. York will be worse for the lack of it.