From fallen high street giants like BHS, C&A and Toys R US to cherished independent stores like Casey’s sweet shop, Jenners department store, many of these businesses have sadly shut their doors for goods since these nostalgic pictures were captured.
But others have weathered the storms, including Covid and online shopping, and are still flourishing all these years later.
Toy shops, record stores, award-winning butchers and fishmongers, and fashion outlets are among the firms pictured in this retro photo gallery.
Chart-toppers Wet, Wet Wet, and the legendary ballet dancer Dame Margot Fonteyn are among the famous visitors pictured, at HMV and a famous Glasgow bookstore, respectively.
But these atmospheric images also show ordinary customers, from an 18-month-old getting fitted for shoes and a young girl playing with Sylvanian Families characters to one of the first shoppers through the doors of a new Argos store.
Among the shops pictured is the fabulously named Sheepish Looks knitwear store, the treasure trove discount outlet Ali’s Cave, and a fishmonger’s with a very unusual catch on display.
How many of these stores do you recognise, and what shop from the 80s do you miss most?
For more 80s nostalgia, why not check out this look back at the most popular perfumes and aftershaves of the decade?

25. Body Shop
The Body Shop cosmetics and beauty store at Edinburgh's Waverley Market, in September 1989 | TSPL

26. Rae MacIntosh
Customers looking at musical instrument tuition books in Rae MacIntosh (Music)'s newly-refurbished shop on Queensferry Street, Edinburgh, in 1988 | TSPL

27. Radio Rentals
Shops on Great Junction Street, Leith, Edinburgh, including Radio Rentals, Alex Munro, and Sibbald Travel, in July 1988 | TSPL

28. Azteca
Baby Nico modelling children's fashions from Azteca, playing with a tortoise money bank on the counter of the Edinburgh shop, on St Stephen Street, in December 1988 | TSPL

