Britain was once known as a ‘nation of shopkeepers.’ Now, not so much: CNBC UK Exchange

The bitter is felt most precisely in the sale of fashion retail and reflects increasing competition from online competitors such as Asos and Shein.

The new look, which has satisfied young people and 20 things for 55 years, has been fighting for his life, and when his leasing was expired earlier this year, about one quarter of his total is announced to close his 100 output plans.

The old river Island, which dates back to 1948 and swing in the 1960s, called for a possible restructuring in the marking of Chelsea while riding a mini skirt explosion. Currently, it employs about 5,500 people in more than 250 stores.

In the last decade, they are following a long-known England retailers series to cover their doors-including soldiers, Dorothy Perkins, Ted Baker, Thorntons, Carpetright, Paperchase and Debenhams. Others, such as Body Shop and Wilko, are under new owners who tend to come with a largely reduced store land.

The retail sector is not alone in suffering. Hospitality is also influenced by even byron Burger, Chipotle, Frankie & Benny’s and Pope John’s closing sites throughout England. The last injured was Ping Pong, a popular Dim Sum chain that was well closed after 20 years. In addition, private capital investors, which once had 100 sales points and now seek a new investment chain, can be closed in Côte, a chain of Brasserie.

According to the Retail Research Center, which is a data provider, approximately 17,350 retail site is expected to be closed this year. During the year 2024, after the closing of 10,494 in 2023, approximately 13,479 stores were closed. It is both right and worrying to say that the trend is accelerating.

These include Bob Wigley, a common owner of Margot, a popular restaurant in London’s Covent Garden, which was forced to close.

Wigley, one of the most well -known investment bankers of the city before, said to LinkedIn’s managers of the restaurant: “We got rid of Covid, but we can’t survive.”

The government said that tax changes to CNBC were “difficult but required” and “to protect the salaries of working people from higher taxes” and that they are necessary to invest in public services.

The British retail consortium, the main industry organ, estimated that the hike in the employer NICs would cost only £ 2.3 billion to the retail sector.

Other nearby factors include an increase of £ 11.44 ($ 15.38) per hour of the last increase in the minimum wage. The age of the overturned age was reduced from 23 to 21-while making the young workers more expensive, the rate of 18-20 years of age rose from £ 9.60 per hour to £ 10 per hour. Fees have also increased as a result of the increase in the strict labor market and economic inactivity since the average of the average gains above the average in the economy.

But unemployment – and, however, when the work insecurity – begins to increase, consumers are gradually eating or becoming more frugal. Britain’s savings rate, which rises during the pandemic and later remained high, is now falling for the first time this decade.

As Clive Black, the President of the Consumer Research at the investment bank Shore Capital and one of the most famous retail observers of the city, has recently put into a customer note: “British consumers are safe low from Britain.”

Local councils also increased parking charges and called “low-traffic neighborhoods”, making high street shopping difficult for those who trust in their cars, and many larger operators-Next and Marx & Spencer-such as-such as passing into non-city retail parks.

However, there are longer term factors. Most non-domestic properties, such as a tax, stores, offices, bars and warehouses, which dates back to 400 years ago, faced the “negative value” and mortar retailers much harder to online retailers such as Amazon, and this has removed the high streets.

Last year at the election manifesto, the Management Labor Party promised to “balance the playground between the high streets and online giants”, but many people in the industry, including supermarket floors such as Sinsbury’s, Sainsbury’s and Co-op. The government said the work rates system was designed to “protect the street” and support investment.

Regardless of the acceleration at the closing of the store increased the fear that it was a structural decline rather than just cyclical. There is some evidence for this.

In the past, when a settled retailer was forced to work, other operators took steps to replace them. A good example is the British branch of Woolworths, a very popular store chain, with closed-27,000 sales points at the end of 2008 and early 2009. For many of them as B&M competitors, new tenants were found quickly, and the sites took a step to rent a cheaper rent. Most of them are now fighting, such as Poundland, Poundstretcher and the original factory shop.

However, when a store was closed, more recently, it was closed, which was added to retail parks with a sense of decay, which was added to Exodus. The uprising decreases when a large retail target is closed or moves.

Accordingly, a typical British High Street, which has familiar names such as Boots, Woolworths and Marx & Spencer in the 1980s or 1990s, is more likely to host our ferry shops, American -style sugar stores, tattoo halls and philanthropy shops.

The sense that this is a structural change reflects a change in retail property ownership. Great British commercial property players such as Land Securities and British Land, which they are exposed to in the retail sector, will do this largely through retail parks or shopping centers. Typical High Street host is more likely to be a “mother and pop” operator who cannot offer better conditions when they face difficulty in these days.

All of this sounds like a perfect storm, but there is another factor in the game: when entering the 21st century, when Amazon began to eat lunch of old bricks and mortar retailers, there were too many players.

Many retailers will not meet the idea, but perhaps what we see in the last quarter century is too much capacity from the market.

– Ian King