CHEPSTOW'S oldest electrical retailer SER Beard is shutting up shop, looking to close in the next couple of months depending on stock clearance.

The high street store, which was opened in 1938 by Samuel Edgar Ralph Beard, has seen the most dramatic technological evolutions of our time, starting from the wireless to DAB radio, gramophone to MP3 and black and white valve television to high definition LCD.

Samuel Beard passed the retail reins to his son John, who has worked in the shop for his entire working life, amounting to nearly 50 years.

John and his son Ian have upheld the Beard ethos as an old fashioned family business with an old fashioned idea of service, priding themselves on a personal approach.

John, who will be 69 in November, said the decision was a hard one.

"I've got mixed feelings of course," he said.

"I've done nearly 50 years but things are getting harder and harder. There is a lot of competition, which is getting worse, and online is hard.

"Technology is moving so fast which I find difficult, although my son can keep up with it."

John feels it's time to do something different.

"I'd like a couple of years doing what we want to do. My wife and I, we like to visit different parts of the country so we might go around touring and take it a bit easier and rent the shop out.

"My son is going to continue sales from home, so the products will be available online and over the phone."