A NEW addition to a North-East town centre made life sweeter for shoppers yesterday (Saturday September 28).

Sugar and spice and all things nice were on offer at the opening of The Retro Sweet Shop in Darlington.

Crowds packed the colourful new premises to sample the wares of enterprising local businesswoman Sannae Aljabory who offers a wide range of traditional and American sweets.

Ms Aljabory, 24, started selling the sweets from a market stall in April and has since seen her enterprise go from strength to strength – with an initial outlay of £170 transformed into a roaring trade that sees her placing weekly orders of more than £3,000 in order to meet demand.

She said: “These sweets went out of fashion and you couldn’t get them any more but now everyone wants them.

“Our best-sellers are things like Lucky Charms and our Jellybelly range.”

The move to the centre from a more remote location in the town is just one of a number of ways in which Ms Aljabory has worked to boost her business.

She offers an online delivery service via just-eat.co.uk that sees her deliver sweets to hundreds of homes each week and has also set up a Christmas savings club for her customers.

A festive delivery service will also see children across the area treated to a visit from Santa bearing lots of sweet treats.

The shop, on Priestgate, is open Monday to Saturday between 9.30am and 5pm.