Young bargain hunter Lily-Mae Zheng, 6, with her last-minute bargains. (Picture by Tom Tardif, 0695775)

WOOLWORTHS closed its doors for good yesterday.

The collapsed high street giant’s Guernsey branch was busy throughout its last day but the shelves were looking bare and the pic ‘n’ mix sweets had all but run out.

Some islanders had gone simply to pay their respects.  ‘I had to go in, just for one last look. I feel very sad to see it all go,’ said hotelier Malcolm Davies, 65.

‘I haven’t bought anything today but I just wanted another look around. It was a shop you could always see in towns, a familiar name that is going.’

It is now uncertain what will happen to the property, which is owned by the local Norman family.

Woolworths PLC sold it to Castle Properties for £5.35m. in August 2007 in a move regarded as an attempt to inject capital into the business. Roger, Geoff and David Norman and Jocelyn Young, as directors of West Quay Holdings Ltd, then acquired the property the following month for an undisclosed sum.

West Quay director Geoff Norman, a former States member, did not wish to comment on being left without a tenant or how long it might take to find one.