Coronavirus: JD Sports, Dunelm and ScS shut stores amid lockdown

Johnson ordered lockdown across the UK and said that only shops selling essential products such as groceries, medicines and pet food should remain open during the next three weeks.

JD Sports told the City this morning that all of its stores in the UK, Europe and the US are now closed, but that it would continue to trade online during the pandemic.

JD said it had recorded “resilient performance” online, but that only offered “comparatively small mitigation” to the sales lost through its physical portfolio.

The retailer scrapped its sales and profit guidance for the year ending January 2021 and said it does not expect to provide its full-year results for the year ending February 1, 2020, until May.

JD said that its “combination of a strong balance sheet, net cash resources and the substantial working capital facilities” would allow it to emerge from the coronavirus crisis despite having to shutter stores across its markets.

Executive chair Peter Cowgill said: “Along with everyone else, the group is experiencing major disruption to our business operations as we seek to protect our colleagues and customers from the effects of Covid-19. Their safety remains our number-one priority and we continue to take all appropriate action in line with government advice in our various territories.

“JD continues to offer a market-leading multichannel proposition in sports fashion retail and we are confident that we will emerge from the current challenges in a strong position to resume our previous positive momentum.”

Dunelm closed its doors to customers yesterday, but had intended to open them up as contactless collection points for click-and-collect orders and to “perform activities which supported local people”, such as befriending services and local deliveries for elderly and vulnerable shoppers.

However, it said this morning that it had reviewed that approach following Johnson’s announcement and would temporarily close down all customer-facing operations.

In the 10 weeks to March 7, Dunelm said like-for-like sales jumped 6.5%, with online sales surging 31.9%. But in the two weeks that followed, the retailer suffered “a progressively negative impact” on trading as reduced footfall drove like-for-likes down 8.8%.

Dunelm boss Nick Wilkinson said: “These are unprecedented times, but Dunelm is a strong business, which has been built over 40 years on the foundations of close relationships with our customers, colleagues, suppliers and shareholders. Our business principle to ‘do the right thing’ is more important than ever in the current situation.”

Scs has also moved to close stores in the wake of Johnson’s speech and said it is “reducing cash expenditure to protect our liquidity in the short term”.

The furniture retailer has already agreed with landlords to pay rent one month, rather than one quarter, in advance, and said it will “continue to evaluate” its capex plans in a bid to mitigate the “severe but plausible” impact coronavirus could have on the business.

Despite the risks, ScS insisted it remains “a resilient business” that is “well positioned to navigate this event and return to growth when the economy recovers”.

Meanwhile, Games Workshop said it had now closed all of its stores, headquarters, factories and warehouses globally. Where possible, its staff will work from home.

It said: “Our priority is the health and wellbeing of our staff, their families and our customers.”