Guy White, managing director of The Laurels Service Station in Horncastle, Lincs, could soon find out if his expansion plans will be going ahead after the local authority called an “extraordinary meeting” for October 13.
Five years ago, White purchased the filling station on the other side of the road to The Laurels, with his new acquisition sitting on an otherwise undeveloped 3.8-acre plot.
White says the forecourt was “very old fashioned”, with small and dated underground tanks, so he immediately began to look into redevelopment options.
Simultaneously, supermarket giants Aldi and Lidl were both seeking to build new stores in Horncastle, a market town with a population of around 7,000 that, crucially, impact assessments had found could only support one supermarket.
Lidl submitted a planning application to knock down a petrol station and build a new supermarket at one end of Horncastle, while Aldi decided to partner with White, with the retailer planning to construct a new outlet on 2.85 acres of his site, which sits at the other end of the town to Lidl’s plot. White would build a new forecourt on his remaining land, offering EV charging and valeting in addition to a filling station and a ‘Tastes of Lincolnshire’ shop offering local produce.
In November 2022 East Lindsey District Council granted planning permission for Aldi and White’s project to be built, at which point Lidl applied for a judicial review at the High Court, arguing that the council had failed to give its application due consideration.
The High Court agreed with Lidl and revoked Aldi’s planning permission in July 2024, ruling that both its application and Lidl’s must be resubmitted. Due to the symbiotic nature of White’s and Aldi’s plans, his new forecourt was also put on hold.
Now, East Lindsey District Council has called for a meeting between White, Aldi and Lidl to be held on Monday, October 13 – an unusual move given the authority’s planning committee normally meets on the first Thursday of the month.
“I hope we get an answer on October 13 so we can move forwards. I know the council has been taking legal advice, and it’s been expensive for them. I honestly don’t know what the meeting will bring”, White told Forecourt Trader. “It shouldn’t be this hard to bring 60 new jobs to a small market town, and people want it – the community wants it.”
White says Aldi has been “fantastic to work with”, and believes the firm is, like him, “very keen to put back into the community”.
