TED Baker has confirmed they will close their remaining 31 stores this week, putting more than 500 jobs at risk.
The rest of the fashion brand’s branches are set to pull down the shutters for good by the end of Tuesday.
Ted Baker fell into administration earlier this year after a deal went sour between its American owners, Authentic Brands, and a Dutch operating partner that was meant to run the store operations.
Administrators at Teneo have been trying to find a rescue buyer for the business, but it is understood that House of Fraser, owned by Mike Ashley’s Frasers Group pulled out of early talks.
When Ted Baker fell into administration in March it employed 975 people and had 46 shops in the UK and Europe.
Administrators have already closed 15 stores across the UK with the loss of 245 jobs.
But it had been hoped that the remaining stores would stay open.
Shoppers have spotted huge clearance sales at Ted Baker sites across the country, although at the time administrators denied it was part of the administration process.
The collapse of Ted Baker is a sad decline for a fashion brand that a decade ago was one of the strongest names in the retail sector with 550 shops and concessions around the world.
The brand never fully recovered from the ousting of its founder, Ray Kelvin, over “forced hugging” allegations in 2018.
By the time Authentic Brands took Ted Baker private in a £212million takeover in 2022 the business had lost 98 per cent of its value.
Authentic Brands owns Juicy Couture and Reebok as well as the royalty rights to Marilyn Monroe’s estate.
Use our interactive map below to see the full list of Ted Baker stores at risk
What is happening to the British high street?
The news comes amid a challenging time for the whole of the UK’s retail sector.
High inflation coupled with a squeeze on consumers’ finances has meant people have less money to spend in the shops.
Also the rising popularity in online shopping has meant people are favouring digital ordering over visiting a physical store.
Unseasonably wet weather has also deterred shoppers from hitting the high street.
This ongoing issue has seen brands such as Paperchase, andThe Body Shop.
Full list of Ted Baker stores which have shut
THESE are the locations of the stores which have already closed:
- Birmingham Bullring
- Bristol
- Bromley
- Cambridge
- Exeter
- Leeds
- Liverpool One
- London Bridge
- Milton Keynes
- Nottingham
- Oxford
- Bicester
- Brompton road
- Floral Street, London
- Manchester Trafford
What other chains have collapsed in recent years?
Most recently, Carpetright filed a notice to appoint administrators on July 12.
Flooring retailer Tapi then struck a multimillion-pound rescue deal to save the brand and dozens of stores.
Tapi has agreed to purchase 54 of the ailing chain’s stores and two warehouses in a pre-pack administration deal that will save 300 jobs.
However, the deal does not include 200 other stores which face an uncertain future, and over 1,000 job losses are on the cards.
We have seen several big losses in the last few years including popular discounter Wilko.
Following several failed rescue bids, fellow bargain chain The Range bought Wilko‘s name and intellectual property.
CDS Superstores, trading as The Range and Wilko, relaunched the latter’s website before relaunching stores as well.
Fans of Paperchase were devastated when the retailer disappeared from the high street in April last year.
It fell into administration in February after failing to find a buyer.
This led to the closure of all of its 134 shops including concessions stands in Next and Selfridges, with 900 job losses.
Supermarket giant Tesco bought the rights to the brand and announced earlier this month that it would be returning to hundreds of stores.
Health and beauty chain The Body Shop fell into administration early in 2024 and announced the closure of many of its 200 stores.
Almost 500 staff are set to lose their jobs after 75 stores were earmarked for closure.
Since then, it’s been confirmed that Aurea Holding, an investment business, is set to acquire The Body Shop after beating out competing bidders in an auction process.
M&Co fell into administration in 2022 but was expected to make a surprise comeback in autumn 2023.
Fellow retailer Yours Clothing bought the M&Co brand and intellectual property after the chain went into administration in December 2022.
Why are retailers closing shops?
EMPTY shops have become an eyesore on many British high streets and are often symbolic of a town centre’s decline.
The Sun’s business editor Ashley Armstrong explains why so many retailers are shutting their doors.
In many cases, retailers are shutting stores because they are no longer the money-makers they once were because of the rise of online shopping.
Falling store sales and rising staff costs have made it even more expensive for shops to stay open. In some cases, retailers are shutting a store and reopening a new shop at the other end of a high street to reflect how a town has changed.
The problem is that when a big shop closes, footfall falls across the local high street, which puts more shops at risk of closing.
Retail parks are increasingly popular with shoppers, who want to be able to get easy, free parking at a time when local councils have hiked parking charges in towns.
Many retailers including Next and Marks & Spencer have been shutting stores on the high street and taking bigger stores in better-performing retail parks instead.
Boss Stuart Machin recently said that when it relocated a tired store in Chesterfield to a new big store in a retail park half a mile away, its sales in the area rose by 103 per cent.
In some cases, stores have been shut when a retailer goes bust, as in the case of Wilko, Debenhams Topshop, Dorothy Perkins and Paperchase to name a few.
What’s increasingly common is when a chain goes bust a rival retailer or private equity firm snaps up the intellectual property rights so they can own the brand and sell it online.
They may go on to open a handful of stores if there is customer demand, but there are rarely ever as many stores or in the same places.
