New floor vinyls boost downloads

Downloads of audio tours of Shrewsbury have boomed since specially-designed floor vinyls were introduced around the town centre. 

The Shrewsbury Stories series was launched during the pandemic by Shrewsbury BID to showcase the town, both to visitors and those who may not be able to visit in person. 

The audio tours take the form of podcasts, with local historians sharing quirky stories of the town, and can be downloaded to a smartphone for listening whilst walking around the town, or simply enjoyed at home. 

Large floor vinyls have now been placed where each episode has been recorded, both to raise awareness of the series in general, and to direct people while they listen to the audio tours. 

Emma Molyneux, of Shrewsbury BID, said: “The vinyls are made from durable materials and look really effective - we have had lots of positive feedback from visitors and businesses. Interestingly, we have seen a big rise in the number of listeners since they were introduced and the audio tours have now been downloaded more than 1,000 times.” 

The first four episodes of Shrewsbury Stories featured St Mary’s Church, The Bear Steps, Shrewsbury Castle and Old St Chad’s - with new episodes now launched to cover the library, Wyle Cop and Milk Street, Shrewsbury Unitarian Church, the Abbey, Grope Lane and Medieval Shrewsbury. 

The series has been coordinated by Alex Whiteley, of the Shrewsbury Biscuit Podcast, and has been designed to complement the walking tours run by the Visitor Information Centre. 

Alex said: “Finding out about Shrewsbury's amazing history by some of its finest historians is such an amazing privilege. I am honoured to have been given the opportunity to put this together and I hope people enjoy what we made.  

“I want to say thank you to Stan Sedman, Nigel Baker and Richard Fyffe for taking the time out to carefully take us all for a walk through history. I would like to encourage us all to spend a bit of time being a tourist in your own town, you never know what you might find out. We have more to come too, as there are plans to add a couple more tours to the impressive playlist." 

You can find the podcasts at https://originalshrewsbury.co.uk/features/shrewsbury-stories or search ‘Shrewsbury Stories’ on your favourite podcast provider.