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FSP’s retailer database has recorded one administration since our January update, bakery retailer Cooplands of Doncaster. Cooplands underwent a pre-pack administration process which saw the closure of 39 stores and the loss of 300 jobs. ReSolve acquired the remaining 42 shops.
Given the trend for most retail failures to occur during the first quarter of the year, one administration in February isn’t bad going. We will wait to see what March brings.
Dubai-based vegetarian fast-food franchise Just Falafel closed down its UK operations this month following a change in the company’s overall direction and strategy worldwide, although the company has not ruled out a return to the UK market.
Highlighting the ever-changing ways consumers like to shop and the evolution of mobile commerce, the Banking Moving Forward study by Experian reveals that a third of the UK population believes that credit or debit card payments will no longer be the preferred method of payment in 2020 and that paying with smartphones will take over.
Continuing this increasing trend of mobile shopping, a study by Paypal and Ipsos has revealed that mobile shopping is growing at nearly four times the rate of overall online spending in the UK and is poised to overtake traditional online shopping. They predict that mobile spend will grow at a rate of 36% from 2013 to 2016, while overall online spend will grow by 10%. Smartphone shopping only accounts for 8% of online spend, while shopping on tablets accounts for only 6%. In comparison, laptops, desktops and notebooks together account for 86% of all online shopping.
Having been the topic of many discussions over the last year, and still rearing its head in the national press, recovery on the high street still "hangs in the balance" as a huge number of town centre leases approach expiry in the next few years, Deloitte has warned. Shop vacancy rates in the North were more than twice those in the South and the situation looks likely to be exacerbated by the vast number of leases that are scheduled to expire by the end of the decade with little prospect of renewal.
The latest British Retail Consortium and Springboard footfall monitor show that Britain’s high streets suffered a 1.6% fall in footfall in January as shoppers continued to turn to out-of-town locations, which increased by 1.5% compared to the same period a year ago. Shopping centre footfall also fell by 2.6%. The BRC said the rise was a sign of "strong" consumer confidence, as it suggested that more consumers were happier to splash out on big ticket items, particularly furniture, and is evidenced by a five point rise in GfK’s UK Consumer Confidence Index.
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