AT LEAST six stores are set to close in the coming weeks in a fresh blow to high streets across the UK.
Shoppers have been hit with a swathe of closures in recent years as households’ favourite chains have shuttered a number of sites.
But while many retailers are reducing their footstep on the high street others are continuing to open new sites, with one old favourite continuing its return this month.
Troubles on the high street have been apparent for several years.
The cost-of-living crisis has meant households have less money in their pockets, leading some to cut back on their spending.
This has had a knock-on effect on high street shops, which have seen lower footfall and less money landing in the tills.
That, coupled with ongoing restructuring plans and high rents, has forced many chains to close outlets as a result.
Figures from the Centre for Retail Research, a research foundation, revealed almost 10,500 shops closed for the final time in 2023.
The 12-month period also saw over 119,000 jobs lost across the sector.
According to the Centre’s most recent data, 1,846 stores have closed and 23,982 retail jobs were lost during the first six months of 2024.
This month will be no different, with at least six stores closing their doors for the last time.
Of course, it’s not all bad news though, in some cases the branches will be replaced with bigger and better shops.
Retailers regularly open and close shops for a number of reasons – not just because they are struggling.
It could be because they have a store nearby that is performing better or it may be because they want to pick a spot that has higher footfall, such as in a retail park.
We reveal which sites are pulling down the shutters one final time in August – plus the chains opening too.
High street card shop Clintons Cards plans to close another two stores in August.
It will close its store in Bexhill town centre on August 4 and its outlet in the Castlepoint shopping centre in Bournemouth on August 11.
Clintons Cards announced last year that it was considering shutting 38 stores in a bid to avoid insolvency.
Half a dozen stores have already closed including in Cambridgeshire, Cumbria, Hinckley, Kettering and Northamptonshire.
Clintons has been affected by reduced high street footfall and competition from online rivals.
In August 2023, restructuring experts FRP Advisory and law firm Jones Day presented plans to save the business in an insolvency court.
They came up with a deal to save thousands of jobs and over 100 UK stores.
But the plan also involved waving goodbye to a number of shops that were not earning enough money to keep going.
At its peak, Clinton’s had 2,500 staff working across 335 shops.
Supermarket giant Tesco will pull down the shutters on its superstore in Chippenham on August 15.
It described its decision to close the store as “difficult”.
But, it has secured a smaller premises in Chippenham town centre, where it will open a Tesco Express.
The new Express store will take up a former Wilko site left empty when the homeware chain went into administration last year.
Despite this store closure, Tesco is pursuing a strategy of expansion with plans to open 70 more stores across the UK over the next year.
M&S will close its department store in the Belfry Shopping Centre in Redhill, Surrey, on August 17.
The retailer has had a presence in the shopping centre for 33 years and the closure came as a huge blow to locals.
In total, the chain has said it wants to close 67 “lower productivity” sites between 2022 and 2027.
But it has said it has no plans to quit the high street and is continuing to open stores, including one in Gallagher Retail Park, Dundee, last month.
Charity RSPCA is shutting its Kenilworth charity store at Abbey End due to soaring rental prices.
The shop has decided not to renew its current lease, which ends on August 31.
A spokesperson said: “We were unable to commit to the ten-year lease with the proposed £3,000 a year increase in rent cost.”
The latest closure is understood to be a one-off because of leasing issues and is not part of a wider issue that could lead to other shop closures.
DIY chain Wickes is preparing to close its store in Moore Street, Sheffield, on August 16.
The chain, which has 230 branches, has had a presence in the city for 30 years.
The closure follows another at a Wickes branch in Bristol, but the chain has not announced wider closures.
EMPTY shops have become an eyesore on many British high streets and are often symbolic of a town centre’s decline.
The Sun’s business editor Ashley Armstrong explains why so many retailers are shutting their doors.
In many cases, retailers are shutting stores because they are no longer the money-makers they once were because of the rise of online shopping.
Falling store sales and rising staff costs have made it even more expensive for shops to stay open. In some cases, retailers are shutting a store and reopening a new shop at the other end of a high street to reflect how a town has changed.
The problem is that when a big shop closes, footfall falls across the local high street, which puts more shops at risk of closing.
Retail parks are increasingly popular with shoppers, who want to be able to get easy, free parking at a time when local councils have hiked parking charges in towns.
Many retailers including Next and Marks & Spencer have been shutting stores on the high street and taking bigger stores in better-performing retail parks instead.
Boss Stuart Machin recently said that when it relocated a tired store in Chesterfield to a new big store in a retail park half a mile away, its sales in the area rose by 103 per cent.
In some cases, stores have been shut when a retailer goes bust, as in the case of Wilko, Debenhams Topshop, Dorothy Perkins and Paperchase to name a few.
What’s increasingly common is when a chain goes bust a rival retailer or private equity firm snaps up the intellectual property rights so they can own the brand and sell it online.
They may go on to open a handful of stores if there is customer demand, but there are rarely ever as many stores or in the same places.
Wilko will continue its return to the high street this month with an opening in Poole.
The new site in the Dolphin Centre will open its doors on August 16.
On launch day, a ribbon cutting will take place and the first 50 shoppers in the queue will receive a goody bag filled with treats from Wilko.
The much-loved retailer has been making a return to the high street after falling into administration in 2023.
The Wilko name and intellectual property was bought by rival discounter The Range in the summer.
CDS Superstores, which trades as The Range and Wilko, has been relaunching the chain at sites in England, Scotland, and Wales.
The company has also said it will be opening Wilko shops in Northern Ireland for the first time.
The Poole opening brings Wilko’s portfolio to six stores.
Earlier this year CDS, which has been slowly bringing the chain back to UK high streets, announced it was opening its sixth shop in Poole this year.
Toys R Us is set to open five new stores in August as it makes its return to the UK high street, with 30 openings planned for the summer.
The August openings are as follows:
The stores will open as concessions inside WHSmith branches across the UK.
Toys R Us was founded in 1957 by American businessman Charles P Lazarus.
It quickly expanded after opening its first store in Wayne, New Jersey, to become a chain of more than 1,500 stores worldwide.
Toys R Us collapsed in 2018 and closed all of its 100 UK branches, but announced plans to relaunch in October 2021.
Discount retailer B&M is to open its expanded store in Harpurhey, Manchester, on August 24.
While some of its rivals have struggled over the past few years, B&M has been thriving, opening a number of new sites in the past two years.
The opening is among 14 planned by the bargain chain as it continues to expand across the country.
Three of the planned openings are relocations to larger or better sites, while this is the expansion of an existing site.
M&S is to open a new store in Friern Barnet in August, but it has yet to confirm the exact date it will open its doors.
M&S has been investing in new openings, looking to operate 180 full-line stores and 420 foodhalls across the UK.
The investment follows a string of store closures as part of radical restructuring plans announced by bosses.
Branches in Manchester and Swindon have closed since August last year.
In total, the chain has said it wants to close 67 “lower productivity” sites between 2022 and 2027.
Aldi is pursuing rapid expansion and is expected to open stores this month, although has not confirmed details.
The budget supermarket already has 1,000 locations across the UK, with plans to reach 1,500.
The supermarket is set to invest £550million in expanding its UK footprint this year alone.
Aldi said each new store opening will create around 40 new jobs on average.
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