News
The latest news, updates and analysis on the the UK retail industry. Covering every segment of the market, Retail Sector’s business journalists keep you in the picture.
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Mar- 2019 -11 March
Debenhams in talks to secure £150m lifeline
Embattled department store Debenhams has confirmed it is in “advanced negotiations” to secure £150m funding from its lenders just a week after it issued another profit warning. The company saw a drop in sales for the half year to 2 March, leading it to say the profit expectations it announced…
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8 March
Primark to move 220 roles to Dublin
Primark has announced it will be moving its product operations from Reading to Dublin with 220 staff being told they can either agree to relocate or risk redundancy. The buying, sourcing, quality control, design and merchandising operations departments are currently split between the two cities but the retailer wants to…
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8 March
Waitrose to close five stores affecting 440 jobs
Waitrose has announced it is to close five stores affecting 440 jobs, following a 45% decline in annual profit at operator John Lewis. The stores to close will be Torquay, Teignmouth, Blaby in Leicestershire, Barry in Vale of Glamorgan, and Ashbourne in Derbyshire. Grocery delivery firm Ocado recently dropped Waitrose…
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8 March
Mike Ashley moves to take control of Debenhams
Mike Ashley has announced plans to remove all the directors at Debenhams, except Rachel Osborne who was appointed in September, and appoint himself to the board in an executive role. Ashley, who holds a 30% stake in the department store chain, pledged in a stock exchange announcement on Thursday evening…
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8 March
Worst February in a decade for retailers, says BDO
High street retailers suffered the worst February in a decade for in-store sales, according to figures from BDO’s latest High Street Sales Tracker (HSST). According to the accountancy and business advisory firm, in-store like-for-like sales dropped -3.7% this month from a “poor base of” -1.6% for February last year. Additionally,…
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7 March
LK Bennett enters administration
High-end fashion retailer, LK Bennett has announced it has entered administration. The retailer had lined up administrators EY to undertake the process earlier this week, and earlier today (7 March) LK Bennett’s website announced it was no longer accepting customer orders. The company, founded by Linda Bennett, in 1990, has…
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7 March
John Lewis profits fall to £160m
John Lewis has slashed its employees’ annual bonus to 3% as the department store recorded a 45.4% drop in underlying profits to £160m from £292.8m the year before. In the company’s unaudited results for the year ending 26 January 2019, it attributed its drop in profits to the “significant” operating…
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7 March
Quiz shares plunge following sales ‘shortfall’
Quiz, the omni‐channel fashion brand, has seen its shares plummet after it announced it will launch a “thorough review” of its business following a “significant shortfall” in sales. At the time of writing shares, in Quiz have fallen by 50% after it revealed in a trading update covering the 1…
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7 March
Year-on-year decline in number of retailers using Amazon
The use of third-party platforms such as Amazon, eBay and Google has dropped amongst the UK’s top 250 retailers, according to an industry report. The statistics were included within an annual retail performance index carried out by e-commerce and digital agency, Visualsoft, which found that just 36% of retailers utilise…
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7 March
Smartphone now dominant device for buying online
For the first time, shoppers spent more money through their smartphones when accessing UK retail sites than either of the other two major device types – desktop or tablet – according to quarterly data from the IMRG Capgemini e-Retail Sales Index. In Q4 2018/19 – which covers the festive period…
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