Strabane cafe to remain despite main tenant of building moving on

THE owner of The Cherry Tree café in Strabane, Nathan Stewart, has described the news his café will remain in its current location on Abercorn Square as a ‘bittersweet’ moment.

This comes as Houseproud, the furniture store that has shared the building with The Cherry Tree, begins to wind up operations after seven years in Strabane.

Mr Stewart said: “At one stage, we didn’t know whether we were coming or going from the building and spent a week fretting and scoping out potential new premises.

“Houseproud came to me and said that they were leaving once their lease expires which, as you can imagine, put me on alert.

“Thankfully, following discussions with the owner of the building, he was happy to allow us to continue which was a great relief to not just me, but the girls who work tirelessly at the café and everyone is delighted to be staying put.

“Over the past three years, The Cherry Tree has gone from strength to strength. We are situated on the periphery of the town and there isn’t always a lot of footfall around so, for the café to always be busy shows how much we are valued as customers clearly make the conscious decision to come in and give The Cherry Tree their business.”

He admitted that it will be ‘very sad’ to see Houseproud vacate the building saying it will be ‘almost like losing fellow staff members’, such is the tight-knit bond between everyone.

He added: “This building is conic in Strabane and it isn’t nice to see it left empty, aside from us, once again. I don’t know what is coming down the road, Strabane is crying out for a lot of things and people have their own ideas over what they’d like to see, but whatever comes, it’ll be welcome.”