Where is Telford? About 35 miles north-west of Birmingham and if you’re a little hazy about the location, think of the world’s first iron bridge, in the nearby Ironbridge gorge. If this still means nothing, leave Brum, head for the Black Country and keep going.

When you get there, if you’re on the train, the first thing you see is a large road and a footbridge taking you over it. You’re heading for the town centre, five minutes away, and at its heart is the Telford Shopping Centre.

It’s a large scheme, as centre manager Ray Hoof is quick to point out: “This has been a phased development that’s now more than 1 million sq ft. It’s a premier shopping centre and will compete with anything else in this region. Bullring is new, but we offer an alternative."

Hoof’s point about the phased nature of the centre at the centre of this new town is pertinent. As he puts it: “Phase 1 was built here in 1973. At that point we had 24 units anchored at one end by the first UK deal done with Carrefour. They occupied 100,000 sq ft and at the other end we had a Sainsbury’s superstore, which was the largest outside London at that point and was the most northerly.” He adds: “There was a significant delay until we got the second phase away, but it was to do with the growth in population” (of Telford New Town).

Hoof recounts how Marks & Spencer was going to open a store in 1978 and then decided not to because the town had not grown sufficiently quickly. Yet today, M&S has a large and thriving store in the scheme that is on the retailer’s makeover list to become one of the new-look stores that have recently been springing up around the country.

Anybody visiting the centre will quickly become aware that in many ways this is a case of organic growth over time rather than a blueprint that was executed at one go. The great majority of the scheme was built over one level and it was not until 2003, with an extension to the mall, anchored by a branch of Beatties, that a double-height spur was built.

Hoof comments: “I can remember back in the 1970s this was regarded almost as a shed in a field. I’ve been in this post for 28 years and I’ve seen a few changes.” He has, and today the mall has all the usual suspects, from Bhs to Asda, taking in large branches of Debenhams, Next, New Look and H&M along the way. It’s hard to pinpoint a specific anchor store as there are so many of them and the centre's predominantly single-level aspect means a very large footprint.

The Telford Shopping Centre was originally an output of the Telford Development Corporation and, in line with the most progressive thinking of the time, a decision was taken from the outset that as well as a shopping mall, Telford would have a very large park in its middle. Today the 450 acres look mature, replete with a grove of cherry trees - a gift from a Japanese company when it moved into Telford. Commenting on the park, Hoof says: “I suspect Telford is unique in Britain in having this kind of facility.”

The mall was bought by institutional investor USS in 1990 and almost immediately a refurbishment programme was undertaken. The upgrade programme has seen a host of new features being bought into the mall with higher levels of natural light (according to Hoof, there were areas that suffered from having almost no daylight,) raised ceiling levels and a clock with a frog automaton that does things on the hour, every hour.

The revamp was more or less complete by the mid 90s and Telford and its shoppers appear to have benefited. Hoof says: “I think USS set out to create different feels in different areas and it wasn’t easy from the beginning they had. But I think it’s working.” He continues: “The average dwell time has now gone up to something over two hours.”

This is a substantial visit and must mean that a fair number of visitors to the centre are treating it as some form of mini-day out rather than a quick trawl around the shops. Footfall is impressive too. In a typical week, the mall sees around 300,000 visitors, rising to over half a million in the Christmas run-up. They are well catered for – there are just under 4,000 car parking spaces and, in common with the car-borne nature of most new towns, more than 90 per cent of shoppers arrive by car.

Graham Burnett, fund manager for the retail property portfolio at the Telford Centre’s owner USS is responsible for the mall's strategic direction. “The recent leasing strategy has been about trying to improve the fashion offer at Telford,” he says. “We started by opening New Row (the newest area in the centre, anchored by Beatties) in 2004.

“Since then we’ve really tried to add to this. New Look tripled its space in the summer of 2004 and on the back of this we started discussions with H&M. They opened in 2005.”

Burnett says that USS has spent “about £80 million” since acquiring the centre in 1990 and that top Zone A is now reaching £180 per sq ft. He adds: We are a long-term investor. We have a 20-year vision for Telford.”

A centre then where something seems to have happened almost every year. Hoof says: “Who knows? Perhaps we can just run the scheme this year.” Perhaps.

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