So, is it all doom and gloom? It really depends who you ask, recently Tesco’s of all people decided to champion high street retailers’ despite their tendency to open edge-of-town superstores they’ve stated “Vibrant high streets are in everyone’s interests, including ours,”
But no matter which big-brand name throws their weight into the fight for keeping our town centres shops open, Stores are simply vanishing from high streets across the UK. Right now it’s pretty much the worst case scenario. Multiple national level retailers have closed their doors over the recent months, and if the big boys start to fall it’s probably a good indicator of things.
The details behind it all suggest that retailers with more than six stores nation-wide are collectively closing an effective 30 shops every day and that even takes into consideration of shops which open for trade. Several data sources which track retailers have pointed out that the situation recently is a continuing downward trend, even compared to the worst months of 2012 (some details can be found via localdatacompany.com)
2013 started not with a bang, but a groan. A collective groan as thousands face redundancy with the ever increasing number of major employers which continue to die off, such as HMV or Republic the state of the high street has caused tens of thousands of people to become unemployed, even comparing this to the fall of Comet which cost six thousand jobs, the high street is haemorrhaging a workforce at an unbelievable rate.
With news that the UK is all but set to endure triple dip recession times are hard and getting harder for retailers and not just big name stores, the figures also include vast numbers of independent retailers, there is an ever increasing trend of empty stores, and now fewer and fewer businesses to repopulate them.
“It’s likely to get worse … The writing is on the wall.”
– Matthew Hopkinson, Local Data Company.
Let’s veer away from the details of businesses and companies for just a moment, let’s take some pointers for what it really boils down to – the people that are affected. The facts are depressing but the number of employees affected by business closure, compared to previous years:
– in 2012: 45,142
– in 2011: 24,025
in the first quarter of 2013 we’ve already seen 17,334 affected, that’s just the first few months of the year, for better comparison let’s break down to the average quarterly detail of the previous years:
– in 2012: 11,286
– in 2011: 6,006
That means that this years’ figures show nearly double the amount of people that are affected by the ever decreasing number of stores.
It’s not all terrible news however, if you’re running a coffee shop, likelihood is that 2013 will be kind to you, similarly low-ticket or pound-shop retailers have seen some positive impact as people continue to tighten purse strings and unsurprisingly supermarkets are doing well, remember how Tesco have all but vowed to help keep the high street alive? Seems like it may not ‘be in their best interest’ despite their brave quotes.
If anything is causing you concern about the future of your business, please remember How to Close a Company offers completely free advice – you just have to call us, 0845 409 4471 and If you do need our service, it is far better to act sooner rather than later you stand to save a lot of time and avoid a lot of stress if you deal with a business closure head on rather than letting it escalate until the situation becomes untenable.
