Simon Brown, owner of House of Cans

EVERY time you walk past an independent shop that is closing down, you can’t help but feel a pang of sorrow at the end of someone’s dream.

Imagine the excitement when the sign went up on the first day.

Nothing lasts for ever, but it was sad to see House of Cans in Soho closing down this week, a labour of love for the owners that simply no longer makes any financial sense. It was perhaps better known for its branch in Coal Drops Yard on the redeveloped railway lands over in King’s Cross, but you could also find an array of tempting craft beers on the shelves at its other store in D’Arblay Street.

The final announce­ment came in the way these things now tend to: an Instagram post.

“Try as we might, and in the face of increasingly tough conditions, we just haven’t been able to make the business work for us,” the picture message said.

“Big love to all of our suppliers too, for continuing to raise the craft beer bar, and real power to all of our contemporaries for keeping on.”

There’s a sense that, in these hard times for most of us, customers – rather than being attracted to independent stores – stick to what they know in the form of familiar chains. Nobody wants to take a chance on an ale they might not like. More importantly, it’s the behemoth companies that have the margins to survive the current economic crush.

That leaves us with the fate of high streets – and even the cute and quirky ones in Soho – being either shuttered or filled with the same old shops as everywhere else.

Soho, surely, should be a place where a business like this is given the chance to thrive.