Bakery giant with over 2,500 branches across the UK to shut store for good in blow for locals
See which other well-known names have disappeared from the high street
GREGGS has left customers “nearly crying” after revealing it’s set to close one of its branches.
The popular pastry and sandwich chain will pull down the shutters of one of its Cambridge stores in just over a month’s time.
The Greggs store on Fitzroy Street will close its doors for the last time on March 31.
The shop is set to shut as part of the Greggs estate strategy, which will see the chain open more stores this year.
Staff at the Cambridgeshire shop will be relocated to nearby branches where possible.
The nearest shop is located in Station Square.
Greggs has around 2,500 branches in the UK, including more than ten in Cambridgeshire.
Fans of the fast food chain took to social media to voice their frustration at the closure.
One said: “Not good. Reasonably priced drinks and food, and they had a toilet. Which is very hard to find in Cambridge.”
Another added: “I nearly cried at reading the news that the Grafton Greggs is closing on 31 March.”
The Cambridge store is not the first Greggs shop to shut this year.
A Greggs store in Amersham, Buckinghamshire, closed for good on January 18.
The branch reportedly closed due to a dispute over rent, according to the Bucks Free Press.
Meanwhile, a Greggs shop on Foleshill Road, Coventry, shut its doors for the final time on January 4.
A sign on the window said: “Sorry, we are closing on January 4, 2025.”
“Your nearest shop is 118/120 Jubilee Crescent, Radford.”
The chain confirmed that the store closure was not part of a wider plan to cut branches.
Greggs is ever-expanding as it aims to hit 3,000 shops in the near future.
It has over 500 branches with franchise partners such as Tesco and Asda and a range of service stations.
Last year it also unveiled a 24-hour drive-through service which can now be found in 42 locations across the UK.
To find your nearest Greggs visit its website and use the Store Locator tool.
You can also order Greggs food to be delivered online from most branches via Deliveroo and Uber Eats.
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.
The British Retail Consortium has predicted that the Treasury’s hike to employer NICs from April 2025, will cost the retail sector £2.3billion.
At the same time, the minimum wage will rise to £12.21 an hour from April, and the minimum wage for people aged 18-20 will rise to £10 an hour, an increase of £1.40.
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.
In some cases, stores have been shut when a retailer goes bust, as in the case of Carpetright, Debenhams, Dorothy Perkins, Paperchase, Ted Baker, The Body Shop, Topshop and Wilko 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.
The Centre for Retail Research (CRR) has warned that around 17,350 retail sites are expected to shut down this year.
Other shops leaving the high street
Greggs is not the only chain to pull shops from the high street.
Beales, one of Britain’s oldest department stores, has launched a closing down sale before it shuts its last remaining shop after more than 140 years.
The company will shut its branch in Poole’s Dolphin Centre on May 31.
The sale includes fashion, furniture, gifts and cosmetics, being sold for up to 70% off.
Beales chief executive Tony Brown blamed the “devastating impact” of the rise in national insurance contributions and the higher minimum wage for the store closure.
Meanwhile, high street fashion chain New Look has begun to close stores as it scales back its UK footprint.
It is understood to be shutting nearly 100 stores – equivalent to around a quarter of its 364 shops.
Stores in Gateshead, Tyne and Wear; St Austell, Cornwall; and Porth, Rhondda Cynon Taf have launched closing down sales.
Reports suggest that the company has been forced to accelerate the pace of store closures due to tax changes in the Autumn Budget.
Meanwhile, Huttons in London will shut its store in the Putney Exchange due to higher costs.
The gift shop became a local icon after it opened in the 1990s.