Town centres hammered as M&S says it will shut 100 stores

After years at number one, M&S is set to lose top spot

MARKS & Spencer has confirmed it is extending its store closure programme from 60 to 100 outlets, in a hammer blow for high streets.

The company is dramatically reducing the number of general stores to reflect the fact that customers are switching to online shopping.

It is feared the closures will be disastrous for town centres as M&S is considered essential in attracting consumers and boosting trade for other stores.

High streets are already facing a threat with the loss of chains such as BHS and Toys R Us. House of Fraser, Carpetright and New Look are also planning to close many shops.

At the same time, restaurant chains including Jamie’s Italian, Carluccio’s, Byron and Prezzo, are shutting outlets.

The increased M& S closure figure includes 21 branches that have already been shut since November 2016.

At the end of March this year, the retailer had 300 general stores selling clothing, homeware and food, plus 696 Simply Food branches and 39 Outlet stores.

Details of the extended closure programme, due to be completed by 2022, came ahead of the publication of M&S trading figures today, expected to show pre-tax profits of £573million down from £614million in 2017.

The chain yesterday named the next 14 clothing and home stores that will close, or are proposed for closure, in 2018/19.

They include Bayswater in west London, and outlets in Fleetwood, Lancashire, and Newton Abbot, Devon – which will all be shut by the end of July. Branches in Clacton, Essex, and Holloway Road, north London, will close by early 2019 as new Simply Food stores open nearby.

The other nine are in Darlington, East Kilbride and Falkirk in Scotland, Kettering in Northamptonshire, Newmarket in Suffolk, New Mersey Speke in Liverpool, Northampton, Stockton- on-Tees, and Walsall in the West Midlands.

Sacha Berendji, M&S retail director, said the closures were ‘vital to the future of M&S’ and would make it ‘more relevant to our customers’. The company said it hopes to redeploy more than 600 staff before considering redundancies.

PRIMARK is gearing up to knock Marks & Spencer off pole position as the UK’s biggest selling clothes retailer, in what would be a landmark moment for the High Street.

the budget chain has seen its market share soar in recent years, while archrival M&S has been hammered.

Figures from analysts at Global Data suggest M&S’s market share by the end of 2018 will be 7.6pc, while Primark’s will be 7pc. Primark sales are growing rapidly while M&S – due to report its latest results today – are declining. At this pace it could see Primark overtake M&S as early as next year.

According to annual reports, Primark made £7bn sales last year, up more than £1bn on the previous year. Of its 345 shops, 182 are in the UK.

Marks & Spencer, by contrast made sales of £3.8bn from its home and clothing division, down 2.8pc on the previous year. Rival Next had sales of £4bn, with £2.3bn from its retail arm.

M&S, which was founded in 1884, has seen its market share in clothing halve by value in just two decades. But while the crisis gripping the High Street forces retailers to close hundreds of shops, Primark is opening more – next month it will create 500 jobs with a store in west London.

In the 24 weeks to March 3, Primark pulled in an 8pc revenue boost to £3.5bn. Profits climbed 6pc to £341m.

Meanwhile M&S is ramping up its closure programme with plans to shut 100 stores by 2022 – 40 more than previously announced.

Yesterday it said the additional closures put almost 700 jobs at risk – it has 1,025 stores in the UK and employs 85,000 people.

Maureen Hinton, group retail research director at Global Data, said M&S is in danger of losing its dominant position in the clothing market.

She added: ‘Marks & Spencer has dominated the market for decades, but its lead as number one is perilously close to being lost to Primark.

‘the closure of yet more stores will hasten the decline unless it can shift the lost sales to its online channel and transfer to its other stores.

‘But it also has to start growing total non-food sales to stem the overall decline.’

Over the past decade, M&S has lost 2.2pc of its market share as it tried to keep up with changing tastes and shopping habits. Of the top 20 retailers in the UK, only Philip Green’s Arcadia Group has lost more share, down 3.1pc, after it sold the BHS chain.

David Buik, an analyst at Core Spreads, said: ‘Retail does look dire in the UK, but it is the dynamics that have changed. the consumer is looking for much more of a bang for their buck.

‘M&S has spent most of the past decade surrendering ground to the likes of Primark, Boohoo, H& M, Zara and even Next. M&S’s fashions are desperately dowdy and have little appeal to the young, who are very savvy and price conscious.’

Analysts are preparing for M&S to announce another drop in profits today, which could see it crash out of the FtSE 100.

M&S declined to comment.