THE shutters came down for the final time at a Merry Hill shoe store on Friday.

An undisclosed number of staff have been left facing the New Year without employment as Barratts Shoes shut up shop.

The closure comes after administrators failed to find a buyer for the store, located on the lower mall of the Brierley Hill shopping centre.

In October, the footwear retailer went into administration for the third time in five years after failing to secure a £5 million cash injection from investors in difficult trading conditions and closed 19 of its 75 stores in November.