Beauty Retailer Boots to Close 300 Stores Across the UK Within a Year
- Chaileedo Press
- Jun 29, 2023
- 2 min read
Boots, the UK-based health and beauty retailer, plans to shut down 300 stores across the UK over the next 12 months.
Boots, the UK-based health and beauty retailer, announced its plan to shut down 300 stores in the UK, reducing the number of stores from 2,200 to 1,900 within a year.
The decision to reduce the number of branches by the UK health and beauty retailer is driven by a desire to improve efficiency. Boots plans to achieve this by closing stores that are situated near other stores, which will allow them to streamline their operations and reduce costs.
Boots currently employs over 52,000 team members. The cutting of 300 stores will impact thousands of jobs. However, the retailer has stated that it hopes to avoid redundancies and that all affected staff will be offered redeployment to nearby shops.
On 27 Jun, Walgreens Boots Alliance, the parent company of Boots released its FY23 Q3 results. Boots has achieved another strong quarter, with retail sales increasing by 13.4% for the three months ending 31 May 2023. This marks the ninth consecutive quarter of market share growth, with gains across all categories, particularly in the beauty sector.
Boots has experienced an increase in the number of customers shopping both in-store and online, resulting in a rise in the number of transactions. Footfall growth has exceeded that of the wider retail market. The retailer's city center flagship and travel stores have seen the largest increase in sales. Additionally, Boots' digital sales have continued to grow, with a year-on-year increase of 25.2%.
Boots stated that beauty, particularly skincare, has continued to perform strongly for Boots, with sales increasing by over 18% year on year. In May, the category experienced its biggest sales week outside of the Christmas period.
Boots' in-house brands were key performers in the quarter, with No7, the UK's top skincare brand, achieving exceptional results. No7's success was driven by its new Future Renew range, with one product selling every two seconds on launch day and over half a million customer transactions in the first four weeks. Additionally, the Boots sun care range, Soltan, saw strong growth in the quarter, with sales increasing by 19%, aided by warm weather.
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