Major charity shop chain abruptly shuts three stores ahead of 47 more closing for good – following wave of closures
A MAJOR charity retailer has abruptly shut three branches with 47 more set to close as part of a major overhaul.
Scope, which runs branches across England and Wales, has shuttered the three stores this month.
A shop in Newport, Wales, shut on April 5, while a Southampton store and Atherstone branch closed on April 11 and April 12, respectively.
A further 43 Scope stores are set to close between now and March 31, 2026, while a further four will shut in the 2026/27 financial year.
This is in addition to 24 sites which have ceased trading since the start of the year.
It comes after Scope launched a consultation in January proposing to close 77 of its 138 shops in England and Wales.
The charity‘s bosses said the decision had been made due to lower footfall at high street branches and spiralling costs.
Chief executive Mark Hodgkinson said the charity’s retail arm had made a “real contribution to raising vital income”, but that external factors had “made trading harder”.
As part of the consultation, it was decided 74 branches would close, not 77, with six shutting during the consultation period which ended in early March.
A further 18 more were closed by March 31.
These are the 18 shops that ceased trading before March 31:
- Amersham
- Barking
- Bangor
- Birkenhead
- Bishop Auckland
- Castleford
- Devizes
- Dewsbury
- Eastbourne
- Haywards Heath
- Lewisham
- New Milton
- Orpington
- Parkstone
- Scunthorpe
- Shirley (Southampton)
- Skipton
- Workington
These are the six shops that closed during the consultation period:
- Bexhill
- Hertford
- Mitcham
- Petersfield
- Scarborough
- Worthing
Of the remaining 47 branches to close, Scope has said five will shut in May, but has not revealed the locations.
The locations for the remaining 42 stores earmarked for closure are also yet to be revealed.
Debbie Boylen, head of retail at Scope, said: “Our shops have helped us raise vital income to support our work with disabled people and their families.
“We know our teams put in their very best efforts, but our shops are collectively now losing money when taking account of all of their costs.
“A number make strong profits but there are loss making shops too. We never take the decision to close our stores lightly.”
She added: “We know they (staff) feel passionately about playing their part in our work, creating an equal future with disabled people.
“We will be doing everything we can to support them and our decision does not reflect their hard work and dedication to Scope.”
HIGH STREET STRUGGLES
UK high streets have been in decline for years due to the onset of online shopping.
High inflation in recent years has chipped away at shoppers’ wallets and purses too.
A recent report from PwC noted a “continued move away from the high street” by retailers in 2024 with shops outside of town and city centres seeing less closures and more openings.
It said this was being driven by both leisure outlets and larger retailers shifting from high streets to retail parks which offer shoppers “greater convenience”.
The Centre for Retail Research said more than 13,000 high street stores shut in 2024, with more to come in 2025.
The centre’s analysis found that 13,479 stores, the equivalent of 37 each day, shut their doors for good over the calendar year.
Of these, around 11,340 independent shops were shut during the year – a 45.5% jump against 2023.
The centre estimates around 17,350 stores will shut in 2025 too, linking the rise to hike in employer National Insurance contributions (NICs) and national minimum wage.
Since the start of the month, employers have had to pay NICs at a rate of 15%, up from 13.8%, starting from £5,000 instead of £9,100.
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.”
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