In a move that would generate 3,400 employment, Marks & Spencer has revealed plans to establish 20 new stores around the UK. On the next fiscal year, eight full-line shops will open in high streets, retail parks, and shopping centers such as the Bullring in Birmingham and the Trafford Centre in Manchester.
Additionally, M&S will construct 12 new food halls, some of which will be located in Scotland’s North Ayrshire, Largs, and Stockport.
According to M&S, the additional openings, scheduled for 2023–2024, will raise the total investment in new shops to £480 million.
A new 97k square foot shop in Leeds White Rose and a 70k square foot store in Liverpool ONE, both scheduled to open in summer 2023, are included in the pipeline of new stores for 2023–2024.
Other significant shops will debut later in the year, including a 65k square foot store in Birmingham Bullring (autumn 2023), a 96k square foot store in Manchester’s Trafford Centre, and a 98k square foot store in Lakeside Thurrock, all scheduled to debut in winter 2023.
As part of M&S’ initiative to revitalize presently empty buildings, all five of the new shops will be moved to former Debenhams locations.
Each has bigger aisles and has been developed with local families in mind.
Fresh market-style food halls stocked with the whole M&S Food line, roomy clothing, home, and beauty departments, brand-new M&S cafés, and free parking will all be available.
M&S has planned investments in 12 additional food halls in addition to full-line stores.
These include a 16k square foot shop opening in Stockport in the summer of 2023, a 12k square foot store coming in Barnsley in the fall of 2023, and a 9,000 square foot store launching in Largs, a beach community in North Ayrshire, approximately 33 miles from Glasgow, in the winter of 2023.
Nine of the 20 new shop sites have already been made public, and M&S claims another 11 will follow soon.
The most recent plans by Marks & Spencer are part of a larger restructuring of the company’s retail network. Last year, the corporation said it would cut the number of its full-line locations by 67 to 180 over the next five fiscal years.
“Stores are a vital element of M&S’s omni-channel future and serve as a competitive advantage for how people want to purchase today,” said Chief Executive Stuart Machin.
“Our store rotation program is about ensuring that we have the right stores, in the right place, with the right space, and we’re aiming to rotate from the 247 stores we currently have to 180 higher-quality, higher-productivity full-line stores that sell our full clothing, home, and food offer while also opening over 100 bigger, better food sites.”
The success of our newly moved and renovated businesses has given us the confidence to go through with our strategy more quickly.
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