Legal365 delays opening of retail stores until 2013

Legal365, the Yorkshire-based online service developed by Last Cawthra Feather (LCF) and Freeserve founder Ajaz Ahmed (pictured), will not open its first retail store until next year, it has emerged.

The first store was due to open in Leeds by the end of 2011. Ahmed told Solicitors Journal this morning that three stores would open next year, though he did not say exactly when in the year.

“It will be worth the wait,” he promised. “The delay in opening has helped us learn a lot more about the market and build a better proposition. That is a good thing.”

Ahmed, who this summer urged lawyers to invest in "great ideas, not spreadsheets", said the plan was to open a store in Leeds, followed by one in Manchester, and another in a “small town” in Yorkshire.

LCF has offices in Leeds, Bradford and Ilkey. Ahmed said the reason for choosing Manchester, was because it was a large city and easy to get to from Leeds.

Ahmed said he did not think Local Law’s planned franchise and marketing, unveiled yesterday, centred on convenience stores, announced yesterday, would work.

“If I’m a local solicitor, why don’t I go and advertise in a local convenience store myself?” he asked.

“People who use convenience stores go in and out quickly. They don’t loiter.”

Nor did he think the QualitySolicitors legal access points in WHSmiths were doing well.

Ahmed said it sounded like a great idea, but there had not been anyone manning the stand for months in his local WHSmiths in Leeds and it looked “like an orphan child”.

QS chief operating officer Saleem Arif said this week that the access points had yielded “mixed results”.

“It’s not about the brand, it’s about the way services are delivered,” Ahmed said. “I am still convinced that that the size of the market means that people from outside will make the difference.

“I’m not sure that anyone from inside the sector knows what they’re doing”.