The last Kwik Save supermarket in the district has closed with the loss of up to 15 jobs.

The supermarket's Station Plaza store in Ilkley closed its doors for good yesterday, with staff given little over 24 hours notice.

Today a notice was attached to the door thanking people for their past loyalty.

The closure was one of 79 closures across the country, resulting in up to 700 job cuts.

Three Kwik Saves in Bradford have ceased trading in the past two years and the future of the Ilkley branch had been up in air for several months.

A spokesman for the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers said the abrupt nature of the closures had taken workers by surprise and that it would be working to entice other major retailers in the Ilkley area to employ those affected.

He said: "We will be working to make sure our members get the full redundancy package that they are entitled to. The redundancy process is quite a complicated one and we will be doing our best to help our members through it.

"We will also be talking to our partners around the Ilkley area about what other opportunities there are for our staff.

"A lot of the bigger retailers in the area have been expanding of late and we will be trying to find work for our staff in this expanding market."

The closures come four months after a £50million rescue package was ploughed into the firm by a private consortium of investors.

At the time, Kwik Save said it had been suffering "stock issues", accounting for many empty shelves in the Ilkley store, but promised to work towards replenishing stock to acceptable levels.

In the past week Arla Foods ceased supplying the chain with milk after problems with payments.

The Ilkley store was close to being sold to UK pub and restaurant chain JD Weatherspoon earlier this year but the deal collapsed after Weatherspoon abandoned its plans.

Kwik Save rents the unit from a development company which owns the Station Plaza complex. Other units in the complex are occupied by the main Ilkley Post Office, two restaurants and a café, a Laura Ashley store and other businesses.

Ilkley-based Bradford Council planning officer Martyn Burke said the unit is limited to being used for retail under its current planning permission. It has been a retail unit since Station Plaza was converted in the early 1980s.