BESPOKE cake and patisserie manufacturer La Crème Patisserie is being allowed to continue serving customers from its factory outlet in Cwmbran after temporary planning approval.
The company recently opened its doors to its first-dedicated retail store in Llandaff, Cardiff, and now it has been granted retrospective permission by Torfaen council to sell from its manufacturing unit at Springvale Industrial Estate.
The company primarily serves the hospitality industry, but has diversified to online sales during the Covid-19 pandemic.
A decision report for the plan says: “Partly in response to a downturn in the hospitality demand due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the business has diversified to online sales and delivery to members of the public, and has installed a small kiosk display area at the front of the site for sales to visiting members of the public.”
READ MORE:
- Wedding venue plan at hotel near Abergavenny after £3.5m sale
- Report of 'shock' collar being used on a dog near Cwmbran
- Sainsbury’s shares major announcement with all Aldi shoppers
The application allows the change of use of the front part of the building to be used as a factory shop.
The report says: “The company’s walk-up sales are limited and come mainly from employees [of] and visitors to other industrial units on the estate.”
The council’s highways team said there is “sufficient” parking space within the site to accommodate the shop aspect.
The report said the change in use would not undermine the “vitality, viability and attractiveness of Cwmbran town centre” and “will help the existing business, which has been located there for nearly 20 years, to survive due to its core custom having been taken away by the pandemic and its impact on the hospitality sector”.
It says: “Given Welsh Government’s recent loosening of planning restrictions (on a temporary basis) in order to help businesses to survive and recover from the Covid-19 pandemic, significant weight is given to the economic benefits of allowing this use.
"However, a temporary permission is considered necessary in order to assess the impact of the change on the locality over a post-Covid period of time.”
For this reason, planning permission has been granted temporarily for two years, so the impact can be monitored on a “trial run” basis.
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here