B&Q has reopened more of its UK stores this morning – including the Stevenage facility at Roaring Meg Retail Park.

Following a successful trial period on Saturday, the hardware retailer reopened further stores yesterday and this morning, with appropriate social distancing measures in place for customers and staff.

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B&Q had closed its stores since the end of March after the initial introduction of lockdown measures. It had been running an online click-and-collect service which remains operational – though customers have been waiting in website queues of longer than one hour.

A B&Q spokesperson said: “As an essential retailer, we’ve watched other essential retailers support social distancing in their stores and are now in a position to follow best practice and re-open a small number of our stores as a trial, while keeping our colleagues and customers safe.

“We’re strictly limiting the number of customers in store at any one time, and so customers may need to queue before entering the store.

“All stores have a designated queuing area outside and these have two metre markers to help remind everyone to respect each other’s personal space.”

The Stevenage store at Roaring Meg Retail Park is open Monday to Saturday 8am to 5pm – and 10am to 4pm on Sunday.