House UK website (1 May 2018) It’s fair to say that the last couple of months have delivered doom-laden retail headlines of a kind that we probably haven’t seen since the collapse of Woolworths (among other big names) back in 2008. As I note in the May issue of Soult’s Retail Report, April alone saw Select and Carpetright get their proposals for company voluntary arrangments (CVAs) through, following the approval in March of New Look’s own plans to close stores and cut rents. Meanwhile, Poundworld, Mothercare and The Original Factory Shop (TOFS) have all recently been reported to be pursuing ..read more

Inside the new Psyche fashion store in Durham (12 Apr 2018) Durham Psyche opens In good news for the city, after a succession of recent closures, Middlesbrough-based independent designer fashion retailer Psyche officially opened its new Durham shop in April. Good to see @PsycheFashion now open in #Durham. I'll hopefully get a more detailed look around at next week's launch event! pic.twitter.com/MvT8eo85qq — Graham Soult (@soult) April 5, 2018 The store at 20-21 Silver Street has been created from a former Café Rouge, and stocks luxury menswear labels like C.P Company, KENZO, Paul Smith ..read more

McEwens of Perth a few years before closure. Photograph by Kim Traynor (8 Oct 2013) This week’s news that independent department store chain Beales is to take over the ex-McEwens department store site in Perth, with an expected opening in November, was a surprise on various levels. For one thing, few would have expected that the McEwens site, which closed as a department store in March 2016 after nearly 150 years, would ever be used as a department store again. The fate of such sites is typically for ground floors to be split up into smaller retail or leisure units, with upper levels turned ..read more

Reserved’s frontage to John Prince’s Street (8 Sep 2017) Polish fashion chain Reserved made its long-awaited UK debut last week (6 September), opening in a large chunk of the ex-BHS in London’s Oxford Street at the same time as launching its UK online store. Reserved has taken all of the old BHS store’s prime frontage to Oxford Street – hence the eye-watering £42m lease – and wraps round in an L-shape with another entrance on John Prince’s Street, where the BHS Café used to be. However, unlike the old BHS, it only occupies one trading floor – albeit still 32,000 sq ft – and doesn’t punch thr ..read more

Me against the backdrop of High Row in Darlington (25 Aug 2017) In my job as a kind of “Geordie Mary Portas”, one of the things I most relish is the chance to visit and work with shops and retail centres all over the North East and beyond. Out of the 500-plus towns I’ve been to, Darlington is one of my favourite places. Back in 2012, I tweeted about its “marvellous and characterful buildings and spaces” – and the area around High Row and the Clock Tower is truly one of Britain’s most magnificent bits of public realm. I'm a big fan of Darlington – so many marvellous and characterful building ..read more

A retro touch at the ex-BHS in Darlington (12 Apr 2017) It seems hard to believe how time has flown, but today – 28 August 2017 – represents the one-year anniversary of BHS disappearing from the British high street, 88 years after its first store opened. As you’d imagine, BBC News has published an article to mark the occasion and assess what those vacant stores have become, while Facebook’s ‘On This Day’ handily reminded me of my appearance in The Observer a year ago, where I offered my own thoughts on what might take the ex-BHS space. So, what has been happening over the last 12 months? Kee ..read more

Booths tea and coffee in Fenwick Newcastle (25 Apr 2017) Shoppers in the North East of England can access Booths-branded products for the first time, after a small collection appeared in the Food Hall of Newcastle department store Fenwick this week. Booths nuts and berries in Fenwick Newcastle (25 Apr 2017) There appears to be two Booths-branded gondola ends within the Food Hall, showcasing 60 products in total from the North West-based grocer. One display features Booths’ own label tea and coffee, while the other includes packet items such as nuts, seeds and dried fruit. Booths tea in Fe ..read more

Pep&Co and Poundland in Woolwich (29 Mar 2017) The April edition of Soult’s Retail Report has gone out to subscribers this morning, providing an insightful look at the last month’s store openings and closures across the UK. Not surprisingly, one of the retailers that features prominently this month is Poundland – partly because of the ongoing rollout of Pep&Co shop-in-shops within its stores, but also because of the recent decision to place its 99p Stores subsidiary into administration. With so much going on in terms of Poundland-related openings, closures, rebrands and ownership cha ..read more

BHS in Carmarthen (11 Nov 2012) After details first appeared in a planning application in February, more details are emerging about the new department store concept planned by EWM Group for Carmarthen’s former BHS at 2-5 Guildhall Square. In preparation for the upcoming April edition of Soult’s Retail Report, I’ve been looking at what we know so far, and taking a brief look at what the new store needs to do to succeed. What will the store include? The 16,900 sq ft department store – to be called Days, after the group’s owner Philip Day – will reportedly feature the Peacocks, Edinburgh Woolle ..read more

BHS Uxbridge (5 Feb 2015) French sports specialist Decathlon has today become the latest retailer to announce that it’s taking over ex-BHS space, with its new 18,000 sq ft store at Intu Uxbridge set to open this summer. As the first anniversary of the collapse of BHS approaches, it’s worth looking back at what I said at the time. Back in April, when there was still some possibility that all or some stores could be saved, I explained to Marketing Week that: We are now in quite a different situation from when Woolworths collapsed seven years ago, as many of the retailers who took over Woolwort ..read more