Marks & Spencer fires warning to landlords over loss-making stores

Landlords now expect M&S to shutter more stores than the 110 it has already revealed as part of its transformation plans, following a dinner with chair Archie Norman and chief executive Steve Rowe.

According to The Sunday Times, the duo told property owners that M&S would close any under-performing sites across the UK as it bids to downsize its UK estate of 1,036 stores and increase the proportion of clothing sales it makes online.

The retailer has also shelled out £750m to take its food business online as part of a joint venture with online grocer-cum-tech provider Ocado.

Marks & Spencer said last May that it would close 110 stores, including 85 full-line shops and 25 Simply Food locations.

But at the retailer’s AGM just two months later, Rowe admitted those plans were “not finite”, leaving the door open for further closures.

Norman said at the time that M&S was paying the price for “not shutting stores 10 or 20 years ago”.

One source told The Sunday Times that Norman “really went into bat” against landlords at the dinner, throwing the possibility of further closures into view.

The majority of the 53 stores M&S has shuttered since 2016 have been in secondary towns and cities, but landlords now fear the retailer could axe more sites in prime locations.

It has already pulled out of a handful of high-profile properties, such as its store in London’s Covent Garden, now occupied by Boots.