Rental evidence is plentiful for shops and other retail premises and valuations are undertaken by comparison using the rental method of valuation. For most shops the zoning approach to analysis has been found most suitable. Zoning is not a method of valuation but a means of comparing one shop with another for analysis and valuation. Zoning takes as its basic assumption that the most valuable part of a shop is the area closest to the frontage and areas of sales space back into the shop are less valuable. While it is an attractive idea to adopt a more truly metric zone depth and use a round number such as seven meter zones, this has not been done due to the amount of work involved in re-calculating the areas of all the shops in the country. The usual practice of ascribing fractions of Zone A value to non-ground-floor sales and ancillaries to indicate the value relative to the hereditament was described.