Breakfast Briefing: Retail news on House of Fraser, Lush, Tesco and Scottish retail sales

House of Fraser eyes Chinese expansion

House of Fraser has planned its China debut in 2016 with three large store openings in Nanjing, Chongqing and Xuzhou, The Telegraph reported. The British department store chain would also begin online trading there and in markets such as Australia.

Scottish retail sales fall despite Easter boost

The value of retail sales in Scotland in the five weeks to April 4 fell 0.1% on a year earlier, despite the boost from Easter. According to Scottish Retail Consortium (SRC), food sales value rose 0.5% year-on-year. In the non-food category, sales value in the latest five weeks slumped by 0.7% on a year ago.

Lush enters m-commerce market with iOS shopping app

Handmade cosmetics retailer Lush has made its first foray into m-commerce with an iOS scent and mood shopping app, The Drum reported. The app has been designed to capture the sense-tweaking nature of the retail offering by allowing shoppers browse through scent and feel categories, each displayed using rich imagery colours and styles.

Marked clearly beside each product is a full list of the ingredients used, accompanied with high-resolution photography and video. The firm worked with digital product studio Ustwo to develop the app.

Associated British Foods say Tesco made a ‘mistake’ by removing Kingsmill bread

Primark owner Associated British Foods says Tesco has made a ‘mistake’ by pulling out its Kingsmill bread brand from supermarkets, The Telegraph reported. The grocer has delisted Kingsmill bread from its 3,000 UK stores as it tries to curb costs by cutting the number of products it stocks.

ABF chief executive George Weston said he was ‘disappointed’ by Tesco’s decision but is in talks with the retailer about trying to get Kingsmill back into its stores.