ANOTHER independent clothes shop has been forced to shut after failing to pull in punters.
The store told customers that their footfall was down by 70 per cent and that they couldn’t continue their struggling business.
MBAS Clothing in Nottinghamshire will be closing its shop[/caption]
MBAS Clothing, based in Arnold, Notts, will be closing at the end of April, despite huge efforts to stay afloat.
A spokesperson for the store said: ““At the end of April, we will close our retail outlet in Arnold. Despite huge efforts to entice the good people of Arnold and surrounding areas into the shop, we have not succeeded.
“Our footfall is as much as 70% down on previous years, and we have to face facts that the shop is not what people want.”
It’s not all bad news for the company though as they are planning to continue trading from their warehouse.
“We are not going away though! We will continue to trade and manufacture from our warehouse in Bingham.
“To all our trade accounts and B2B customers, we are still here to provide amazing workwear at great prices backed up by exceptional service.”
The brand supplies a variety of workwear, including hoodies, aprons, chefswear and baselayers.
MBAS Clothing will be holding a closing-down sale in the weeks heading up to the store’s closure.
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.”
