Business bankruptcies

[ckn]

House of Fraser next?

I just got a £600 premium brand suit (jacket and two trousers) for £150 in their current sale. That’ll explain the big sale discounts. 

[Mark S]

Retail is in serious trouble and I don't think that the internet is to blame. IMHO there are a number of factors including stagnant wages, costs of essentials increasing, cost of parking in city/town centres and movement towards non-branded clothes from websites aimed at the youth, Misguided, Boohoo etc.

[SSoutherner]

I think the biggest issue facing retail is the perfect storm of sudden increase in Business rates and employment costs coinciding with a fall in consumer confidence/disposable income

 

At the same time they are having to swallow huge increases in rates from cash starved local authorities they have a rise in min wage (which a lot of retail staff are on), the apprenticeship levy (on any company paying over £3m in wage a year so all big retailers) and the recent advent of compulsory pension contributions (which rise from 1% to 2% employer contribution this Apr). Whilst online retailers may have to pay the higher wages and pensions (if they are uk based) they don't have the rates hike and a lot of the specialist ones are small enough to fall under the £3m cut off for apprentice levy as well.

[Mark S]

There is also an issue where many town centres are just becoming desolate hell holes, full of bargain or pound shops, which are like a disease, and in my opinion are part of the race to the bottom. There are also too many bookies, gold shops and cheap food outlets.

[Blind side johnny]

3 hours ago, Mark S said:

Retail is in serious trouble and I don't think that the internet is to blame. IMHO there are a number of factors including stagnant wages, costs of essentials increasing, cost of parking in city/town centres and movement towards non-branded clothes from websites aimed at the youth, Misguided, Boohoo etc.

It's not to blame but is a factor. Next reported that they have suffered a fall in high street income that is almost replicated by a growth in on-line income. However the high street sales had a gross margin of 60% whereas the on-line income only had a margin of 19%.
The fundamental question to ask is what function high street shops have, and is it still required? In many areas of business the middle-men have been thinned out as they add no real value; in many cases retailers come into this category.

[Bleep1673]

I find a lot of shops that close are still trading over the Internet, another thing is the number of Bank closures. When I moved here Silverhill had 4 Branches of banks, they are all closed now, one has been turned into residential, the rest are empty

[Bleep1673]

12 hours ago, ckn said:

House of Fraser next?

I just got a £600 premium brand suit (jacket and two trousers) for £150 in their current sale. That’ll explain the big sale discounts. 

FROM RANT THREAD;

 

Another one today, I seem to be turning into a Victor Meldrew type...

House of Fraser this time.

They have a sale on, some outstanding prices on good stuff.  I got myself a nice good brand suit, pair of new shoes and a shirt.

The box it arrived in was small, the suit jacket hanger was corner to corner to make it fit and was fairly stuffed into the box.  No damage to the suit but it'll need maybe a steam to get the crush creases out.

The shoes had clearly been worn before, the soles were scuffed and the toe area was damaged.  Obviously worn by someone to an event then returned for a refund and whoever checked them in at the returns warehouse didn't even look at them.

The shirt was "tailored fit".  I'm not "tailored fit" body style and haven't been since the 1990s.  Nowhere on the item description on the website does it say "tailored fit".

And this is why I bloody hate clothes shopping.

[Mark S]

I've just had an email from House of Frasier offering 20% off. It looks like they have fallen into the trap set by a lot of online-only retailers of permanently offering discounts. Once customers get used to discounts on everything it is hard to go back to charging full price. This is not dissimilar to why bargain shops, like Home Bargains and B&M Home are springing up everywhere.

[Vambo]

3 hours ago, Mark S said:

There is also an issue where many town centres are just becoming desolate hell holes, full of bargain or pound shops, which are like a disease, and in my opinion are part of the race to the bottom. There are also too many bookies, gold shops and cheap food outlets.

That is certainly what Accrington is like these days. They're spending/wasting a couple of million on it as well.

When M&S left the town it sounded the death kell. Even the shop that took over that retail space is closing down.

[Saintslass]

I think the Internet has had a massive impact on clothes sales, and it is predominantly clothing stores that are struggling.  For some reason I don't understand, people seem to prefer scrolling through endless screen pictures, picking out a selection of stuff to buy, waiting for it to arrive only to find it doesn't fit or looks totally different, sending it back only to go through the whole process again.

Me, I pop into town, try stuff on at the time, make a purchase - done and dusted in half a day.  

Department stores have been undermined for a while, beginning with out of town retail, which was a bad idea and is now looking much worse for those towns like my own which is also being hit hard by proximity to Liverpool, a shopping centre that is thriving.

Also, retail warned the government that raising the minimum wage would cause problems and I do wish the Tories had not tried to beat Labour at their game in this respect as it has put extra pressure on a vulnerable area of business. 

Finally, business rates are killing off those stores which are struggling. 

It doesn't help that Amazon, with its business model, pays very low business rates due to its warehouses being located outside of town centres and so on relatively cheap land.  I do hope the government decides to tax these online giants on sales as that would bring in a bit more of a level playing field.

[Bob8]

31 minutes ago, Saintslass said:

I think the Internet has had a massive impact on clothes sales, and it is predominantly clothing stores that are struggling.  For some reason I don't understand, people seem to prefer scrolling through endless screen pictures, picking out a selection of stuff to buy, waiting for it to arrive only to find it doesn't fit or looks totally different, sending it back only to go through the whole process again.

Me, I pop into town, try stuff on at the time, make a purchase - done and dusted in half a day.  

Department stores have been undermined for a while, beginning with out of town retail, which was a bad idea and is now looking much worse for those towns like my own which is also being hit hard by proximity to Liverpool, a shopping centre that is thriving.

Also, retail warned the government that raising the minimum wage would cause problems and I do wish the Tories had not tried to beat Labour at their game in this respect as it has put extra pressure on a vulnerable area of business. 

Finally, business rates are killing off those stores which are struggling. 

It doesn't help that Amazon, with its business model, pays very low business rates due to its warehouses being located outside of town centres and so on relatively cheap land.  I do hope the government decides to tax these online giants on sales as that would bring in a bit more of a level playing field.

Town centres often seem to want to appeal to the young.  I wonder if St Helens should accept the inevitable.  It could carve a niche and attract a trickle of old customers from across Merseyside to a relatively peaceful town centre with plenty of places for tea and coffee.

 

[Griff9of13]

31 minutes ago, Bob8 said:

Town centres often seem to want to appeal to the young.  I wonder if St Helens should accept the inevitable.  It could carve a niche and attract a trickle of old customers from across Merseyside to a relatively peaceful town centre with plenty of places for tea and coffee.

 

 I doubt that they'd be able to attract enough big name retailers who seem to gravitate to the larger city centre sites to attract any one demographic.

[Bob8]

3 minutes ago, Griff9of13 said:

 I doubt that they'd be able to attract enough big name retailers who seem to gravitate to the larger city centre sites to attract any one demographic.

To a great extent, I think that has to be accepted.

[Vambo]

38 minutes ago, Bob8 said:

Town centres often seem to want to appeal to the young.  I wonder if St Helens should accept the inevitable.  It could carve a niche and attract a trickle of old customers from across Merseyside to a relatively peaceful town centre with plenty of places for tea and coffee.

 

I certainly think that town centres need to adapt from what they have traditionally always been.

I also think it's possible to do that and appeal to a wide range of people and age groups.

Cafe's and bars are one way to go.

Walking past empty shops is miserable and whilst I believe that budget shops most definitely have their place seeing pound shops close and then get replaced with another pound shop varient is like watching the final nails being hammered into a coffin.

My nearest town feels on its knees because of the image it now as and it will be a hell of a struggle to bring it back through retail outlets. 

[shrek]

There are a mass of online retailers trading from bedrooms/home offices/storage units I've long held the believe if a town like Wigan could turn the now council owned, abandoned shopping center that is the Galleries into a hub from which these could be based you'd create a diverse and vibrant shopping experience that may well go some way to invigorating the town centre.

[graveyard johnny]

almost every item of clothing I have bought over the last 5 years has been from online shopping, clothes (rockabilly niche) that I would never find in any south  Yorkshire town centre, as for pound shops , where would I get my fix of yeoman mash pots and caramac buttons from if they didn't feed my addiction?

[Futtocks]

All the four banks in my mum's small market town have now closed, although both the Co-op and Spar shops have since installed cashpoint machines, which addresses one of the more immediate concerns. Two banks are now cafes*, one is going to be an art gallery and the Barclays has been empty for about 5 years, despite being in a prime high street site.

*as a consolation, one of the cafes does quite tremendously epic bacon or sausage sandwiches.

[graveyard johnny]

the decline in high street bank branches has also had an impact on bank robbers, who would  be "banged up" long before now back in the day, bored , nothing to do except hang around the bookies all day looking sadly over the road to an abandoned nat west

[Bedford Roughyed]

So on the one hand, we have too many coffee shops, pound shops and bookies.  On the other we have too many empty shops...

I see this on my towns Facebook page, moaning about empty shops and moaning about anything that opens.  We have had a burst of Ice cream cafes opening, and people still moan (there’s too many of them...).  The market will decide if there are too many of them. 

The council also gets the blame for everything, BHS closing and still being empty, the rates set by government, private landlords raising rent, etc.  I’m not sure how many people realise what councils can actually do?

[graveyard johnny]

around 25 years ago me and a mate would make the 50 odd mile trip to wakefield and Dewsbury markets to visit the record and music stalls - maybe call in at the hudds record shops if we had time and make a bit of a day of it, have been unfortunate enough to visit both town centres of late and the comparisons of then and now are sad to see, once thriving markets and shops reduced to .......................well, lets just say there not as nice anymore.

[Saintslass]

4 hours ago, Bob8 said:

Town centres often seem to want to appeal to the young.  I wonder if St Helens should accept the inevitable.  It could carve a niche and attract a trickle of old customers from across Merseyside to a relatively peaceful town centre with plenty of places for tea and coffee.

 

They have accepted it.  Well, sort of.  There is a push to move housing back into the town centre and a Liverpool investor has already converted Tyrers (family run department store opened in the late 19th century, closed last year) into flats and is in the business of converting former offices into another block of flats.  It'll take years to reclaim the town centre for housing though - it used to be mostly housing and a high street (with a lively market that died a few decades ago).  

However, a weird thing in St Helens is the presence of ODs.  ODs sells designer labels.  Real designer labels I mean, not knock off stuff.  It's done so well that it now has four shops in the town and has renovated two buildings so they look really smart.  This baffles me.  We can't keep a WH Smith or a Thornton's but we can have a home grown retailer selling designer labels in men's, women's and children's clothes as well as jewellery, all in bespoke separate stores.

[graveyard johnny]

is it true Dewsbury is the only place that mcdonalds has packed up and left leaving the town without one at all for miles?

[Bedford Roughyed]

18 minutes ago, graveyard johnny said:

is it true Dewsbury is the only place that mcdonalds has packed up and left leaving the town without one at all for miles?

Rochdales town centre McDonald’s  closed a few years ago.  There are 2 McDonald’s drive throughs on edge of town trading estates though.

[Saintslass]

43 minutes ago, Bedford Roughyed said:

Rochdales town centre McDonald’s  closed a few years ago.  There are 2 McDonald’s drive throughs on edge of town trading estates though.

That's a bonus  The one town centre store in St Helens that I would love to see close is McDonalds.  Its clientele cause trouble every night and the place is strewn with its litter every morning.

I notice that as well as New Look, Select is now also in trouble. 

Meanwhile, Primark steams ahead and it doesn't even have a website!

[Mark S]

40 minutes ago, Saintslass said:

That's a bonus  The one town centre store in St Helens that I would love to see close is McDonalds.  Its clientele cause trouble every night and the place is strewn with its litter every morning.

I notice that as well as New Look, Select is now also in trouble. 

Meanwhile, Primark steams ahead and it doesn't even have a website!

2

All part of the race to the bottom. Cheap, cheap, cheap, no one paying full value anymore.