UK consumer spend on clothing and footwear will drop from just under £35bn to just over £30bn in the period to 2023, according to Moody’s. It has dropped steadily since the recession, at which point it had hit just over £45bn. That amounts to a drop of approximately one third.

Over the decade since the recession, the UK high street and online environment has transformed as players such as Arcadia and New Look, both of which have been forced to complete CVAs to stay afloat, have proved vulnerable to more agile online competition and the buying power and vertically integrated business models of global giants such as Inditex.