Having traded across SEVEN decades and built up a broad customer base, a haberdashery business in the Cotswolds is set to close imminently with no plan for a new owner to keep the tills going.

Owner Jackie Hall, 79, bought Sew and So, on Stroud's Lansdown, in February 1977 after she popped into the shop to buy a tapestry kit. Fifty-six years on, she is now looking to retire and plans to close the shop imminently.

But in the absence of any clear takeover plan the town is contemplating the loss of a key retail service, triggering an avalanche of dismay on social media.

Sew and So was first set up in 1969 by original owner Wendy Poole and, since Ms Hall stepped in, has gone from strength to strength, the business having succesfully ridden changing trends in sewing from tapestry and embroidery through to cross stitch and on to the current resurgence in interest and demand for dressmaking.

Over the years, Ms Hall said in a recent interview that she put the success of the shop down to building sustained demand through quality, breadth of stock and reasonable pricing.

Punchline-Gloucester.com understands that the building was recently sold and the flat above the shop now has a separate owner: the owner of the shop wanted the existing business to continue, but the owner is set on retirement. Sew and So Ltd officially dissolved as a limited company, records show, during the pandemic in 2021.

Attempts to sell the business with existing stock appear to have come unstuck. Wendy Harris, who had been a potential new owner for the shop, explained on social media: "Sew and So is a very much loved shop and I was due to buy it in February."

The owner sold the whole biilding, the sale completing in January, she said, but stated: "I had agreed to rent [the shop] with the new owner, who wanted the shop to stay as he himself had fond memories of it from childhood."

However, she added that the price of the existing stock had "massively" increased as the sale progressed, consequently derailing the plan. The existing owner had not sought a payment for goodwill, but priced all the stock as new, she added, making the purchase too costly.

Ms Harris said she had finally decided on a Plan B, buying the "also well loved and 40-plus years old" outlet The Sewing Box, a business in Gloucester's Eastgate market.

● Punchline has attempted to contact Ms Hall and will update this story with significant developments. It is understood that the shop is currently operating a sale with 50% off all stock.