Huge outdoor chain with over 300 locations to shut popular store in DAYS after closing another shopping centre branch
A POPULAR outdoor clothing chain is set to another location at the end of the month.
The move comes just weeks after Trespass shut down its Middlesbrough’s Hillstreet Shopping Centre branch.
Highcross shopping centre in Leicester will be the next store on the chopping block.
The shop location will closed its doors for the last time on Monday March 31.
The outdoor retailer previously announced the closure of six UK outlets, including branches in Norwich and Sutton Coldfield in 2023.
In January, Trespass confirmed another closure with a closing down sale at its Middlesbrough’s Hillstreet Shopping Centre location.
The shock move came just two years after the branch opened, with many people believing it to be a one-off closure.
However, now the future of the retailer appears to be a little more uncertain.
Trespass announced the closure of its Leicester location with a massive sale.
The Leicester store launched the closing down sale with 60% reductions on select stock.
Similar yellow and black signs reading “‘everything must go” were posted on the Middlesbrough store’s windows in the lead up to the closure, according to Teeside Live.
The reason for the closure remains unknown, however, this hasn’t stopped locals from speculating.
Some wondered whether if it may be a Leicester issue while others said the store has been on the way out for years.
“They’ve been having closing down sales for at least 10 years,” one Leicester local said.
“Far longer than 10 years, I would wager all of their shops have been having closing down sales since they were founded in 1981,” argued another person.
After the closure of the Middlesborough, some even surmised it was the end of high streets as we know them.
“The days of high street shopping are over unless you are a coffee shop, restaurant, or some large store with a good national reputation,” the shopper said.
RETAIL PAIN IN 2025
The British Retail Consortium has predicted that the Treasury's hike to employer NICs will cost the retail sector £2.3billion.
Research by the British Chambers of Commerce shows that more than half of companies plan to raise prices by early April.
A survey of more than 4,800 firms found that 55% expect prices to increase in the next three months, up from 39% in a similar poll conducted in the latter half of 2024.
Three-quarters of companies cited the cost of employing people as their primary financial pressure.
The Centre for Retail Research (CRR) has also warned that around 17,350 retail sites are expected to shut down this year.
It comes on the back of a tough 2024 when 13,000 shops closed their doors for good, already a 28% increase on the previous year.
Professor Joshua Bamfield, director of the CRR said: “The results for 2024 show that although the outcomes for store closures overall were not as poor as in either 2020 or 2022, they are still disconcerting, with worse set to come in 2025.”
Professor Bamfield has also warned of a bleak outlook for 2025, predicting that as many as 202,000 jobs could be lost in the sector.
“By increasing both the costs of running stores and the costs on each consumer’s household it is highly likely that we will see retail job losses eclipse the height of the pandemic in 2020.”
However, all hope may not be lost with some locations managing to avoid being axed altogether.
The retailer, which has around 300 stores, previously announced the shut down of several branches however many still remain open.
It relocated the Norwich store from Chantry Place to the Castle Quarter, re-opening in November 2024.
The Workington location also moved to an other town centre unit after initially announcing a permanent closure in 2023.
Stores close sites for a variety of reasons including that a particular site is not performing or that a lease is coming to an end.
However, closures are not always an indication that a brand is struggling.