A trader who has run his own toy shop for nearly 30 years has issued a rallying cry for shoppers to make use of independent stores – or risk losing them.

Paul Wohl, owner of Argosy Toys, in London Road, Westcliff, posted the plea on his shop’s Facebook page on Thursday, saying his business contributed more to the area’s economy than national big name brands because of its charitable donations and tax contributions.

The post, which called for residents to shop locally and support independent businesses, was shared by more than 6,000 people in less than 24 hours.

Mr Wohl said: “I was thinking about all the shops which have closed in the area, especially the big established ones, and I started thinking back to all the toys shops which I remember from my childhood and they are nearly all gone.

“I thought to myself maybe the problem is that these shops have been here so long that maybe people just forget about them.

“There is always someone new coming in to distract them. I thought I would put up a personal message just from my experience, to remind people we are here.”

The viral post, in which Mr Wohl criticised big businesses for not paying the right taxes, obviously made an impact and the shop had the same amount of customers through the door in the first two hours of Friday as he normally had in a whole day.

He said: “I expected a few hundred people to see it but within an hour it had thousands of shares.

“We have been rushed off our feet as so many people have seen it.”

In recent times Southend’s independent stores have been facing something of a crisis, with the closures of department store Ravens and homeware store Havens last year. The two businesses had been open for a combined 217 years.

Mr Wohl accepted there were problems, but said he was committed to remaining a presence in the town centre.

“There are lots of chain stores but not that many independents doing it properly any more, I think you could count them on one hand,” he said.

“I am 46 and I remember as a five or six-year-old you could go from shop to shop to shop spoilt for choice of what to buy. Now there is just nowhere near as many shops.”

However Mr Wohl, whose Argosy Toys store has been open for 71 years, said residents were starting to turn to the smaller businesses in the town and ignoring chains like Toys R Us, which went into administration earlier this month.

“I believe people are realising that the internet is great as long as you do not want things quickly,” he said.

“People want service, they want range and they want value which we are able to offer for them. Unfortunately it is us little guys that bear the brunt of problems with the town centre because we don’t have the money behind us.”