A HOME entertainment store ravaged by flooding has put forward plans to protect itself should the rains return.

Richer Sounds in Oxford’s Botley Road plans to raise the store and extend the property to guard against future rising water.

Last winter’s floods forced the store to shut for six days and manager Dan Cook said it cost the business thousands of pounds.

The company has now put in a planning application to demolish part of the structure and build a two-storey extension.

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Mr Cook, 35, said: “We put in the application mainly because of the risk of flooding to our store after what happened last year.

“It will be an opportunity to rework the shop and make it more flood protected. The provisional plan is to raise up the shop and extend it.

“We have already done work to make the inside of the shop more resilient.

“We tanked out the floor with concrete, but thankfully we haven’t had to test it out yet.”

Mr Cook added that the plans were in the early stages and discussions over costs and specifics, such as how high the floors would be, were on-going.

Last January, the store – which replaced the former George Inn pub in 2011 – closed as water seeped in through the floor.

The ground floor flooded and, despite the staff ’s best efforts to move hi-fi systems, TVs and other electronic equipment to higher ground, the company lost more than £25,000 in damaged stock alone.

Mr Cook said: “That was pure stock – at cost price as well, not even retail price. In terms of total loss of earnings, there’s no way of knowing, but it was just after Christmas and right in the middle of our sales period.”

At the time of the flooding, Mr Cook told the Oxford Mail the loss of trade from the closure could have cost as much as £60,000.

The new plans – currently out for consultation – feature higher floor levels to stop a repeat.

A proposed £125m Flood Relief Channel is in the pipeline, to run four miles from Seacourt Park & Ride to the Thames at Sandford Lock, carrying water away from Abingdon and Botley Roads.

Work could begin in 2018, but it won’t be completed until 2022.

Mr Cook said: “Any help is welcome and the channel will be great for businesses and residents alike, but if it’s that far off we need to do something to protect ourselves now.”