SHUTTERS DOWN
Huge high street chain with 1,100 locations to shut ANOTHER store following string of closures
Plus we reveal all the stores shutting this year
A HIGH street chain is set to shut another store following a string of recent closures.
WHSmith has announced it will shut its Accrington, Lancashire, store for good next spring.
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WHSmith revealed that despite the closure they were "disappointed" to be pulling out of the Arndale shopping centre.
The popular store is set to shut due to the lease expiring.
A spokesperson told The Sun: "We can confirm that the WHSmith store in Accrington will be closing on Saturday, March 15.
"It is no longer sustainable to continue to trade from this location and the decision has been taken to close the store as a result of the forthcoming lease expiry.
READ MORE ON CLOSURES
"We are disappointed to be losing our presence in Accrington and we would like to thank all our customers for their support and for shopping with us."
They added that it is "extremely grateful" for its workers and that staff will be redeployed to nearby stores, where possible.
Locals have reacted to the news online with one saying: "Hope the loyal staff find new jobs quickly - good team there."
Another said: "Arndale is pretty much dead and buried."
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A third commented: "The high street is dead and gone sadly."
While a fourth wrote: "Few more years and high street shopping in small communities will be a thing of the past.
Britain's retail apocalypse: why your favourite stores KEEP closing down
"Retail stores will be the only place for people."
The store has received glowing reviews on Google.
One said: "Excellent WHSmiths - a good supply of art materials which is decent quality too."
Another wrote: "Great WHSmith stationary store, one of the best stores for excellent customer service, great choice of books, magazines, gift cards, greeting cards, pens, board games and jigsaw puzzles."
While a third posted: "I went to buy pens but ended up buying a magazine - what an amazing array of hobby and special interest magazines! Truly the best I've seen even in a big city!"
Other WHSmith closures
WHSmith, which runs over 1,100 stores, has closed down several shops across the past few years including in Manchester and Bicester.
Most recently, the stationery retailer announced it would shut its Bolton store for good early next year.
The popular store is set to shut due to redevelopment plans, according to bosses.
The exact closure date is set for either February 14 or 15, a staff member told .
The long-standing Basingstoke, Hampshire, branch of WHSmith has also been earmarked for closure next year.
The store, situated in The Malls shopping centre, has been a fixture in the town for more than 56 years.
It is now due to close down for good on February 1.
WHSmith is preparing to shut its Bournemouth town centre location early next year as shoppers cried "another bites the dust".
Sources close to the business have revealed that WHSmith is set to close its Old Christchurch Road branch, possibly as soon as January.
The chain also pulled down the shutters for the last time on its Bridgwater store in Somerset earlier this year.
It closed at the end of the store’s leasing agreement and the premises were put on the market.
A WHSmith spokesperson previously said: "We can confirm that the WHSmith store in Bridgwater will be closing on Saturday, September 7."
WHSmith customers were also gutted when their local branch on Sale's high street in Greater Manchester closed on September 14.
This is the full list of stores and their closure dates:
- Crewe, Cheshire - March, 2023
- Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire - March, 2023
- Bicester, Oxfordshire - August, 2023
- Manchester - December 2, 2023
- Alfreton, Derbyshire - January, 2024
- Ramsgate, Kent - January, 2024
- Oban, Argyll and Bute, Scotland - February, 2024
- Nantwich, South Cheshire - February, 2024
- Margate, Kent - April 20, 2024
- Bridgwater - September 2024
- Sale, Manchester - September 2024
- Bournemouth - October, 2024
- Old Christchurch Road, Bournemouth - January 2025
- Basingstoke - February 2025
- Bolton - February 2025
- Accrington - March 2025
It comes as the chain is set to expand in travel hotspots, with 15 new branches opening at airports and train stations in 2024.
WHSmith announced that it has no plans to expand its high street presence and instead intends to close up to 20 stores annually over the next three years.
Why are retailers closing shops?
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.
OTHER STORE CLOSURES
It's not just WHSmith closing stores across the UK.
Dobbies set to shut 16 of its branches has said that they will close before Christmas.
The garden centre chain first revealed that it was shutting sites last month but did not say exactly when they would close their doors for the final time.
The chain, which has 77 sites across the UK, launched the restructuring plan to address "historically uneconomical rent costs".
A trendy fashion chain owned by H&M will close all of its stores in a shock move for the high street.
Monki has seven stores in the UK, including a site on London's Carnaby Street and Manchester's Arndale Centre.
That's because H&M has plans to either shut down Monki stores or merge them with another one of its fashion brands, Weekday.
The Scandinavian retail giant wants to blend the two brands together to make a one-stop shop that appeals to young shoppers.
Elsewhere, card retailer Clintons is set to close another store and have launched a huge closing-down sale.
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Andover, Hampshire is to lose its Clintons branch on the high street when it shuts its doors for the final time next year.
Many other Clintons stores are set to close in the coming months, with one in Southend-on-Sea, Essex due to shut in January next year.
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