Next and Greggs close all stores to combat coronavirus

Fashion giant Next will shut its stores from 6pm on March 23 “until further notice” but will continue to trade online. All home deliveries and returns will be free for customers while its shops are closed.

Next said it was also “making every effort” to deliver any uncollected parcels in its stores to customers’ homes. These deliveries would also happen free of charge, the retailer said. Shoppers will be refunded for any unsuccessful deliveries.

The retailer said it would reopen stores “when the time is right”.

Greggs will close its shops following the close of business on March 24 “in order to protect our people and customers”.

The food-to-go operator has already switched to a takeaway-only service and stopped accepting cash payments as part of its efforts to combat the spread of coronavirus.

But today Greggs said: “It is now clear that to protect our people and customers we need to go further and temporarily close our shops completely.”

Greggs said it intends to continue to employ staff at their contracted hours “for as long as is practicable”.

Any unsold food will be donated to local communities, the retailer said.

As part of its update, Greggs said it had suffered “a sharp reduction in footfall” during the past week. Like-for-like sales plunged 9.9% in the seven days to March 21, with the rate of sales decline accelerating on a daily basis.

Greggs said it was “impossible” to provide any profit guidance, but said it did not expect to report year-on-year profit growth as a result of the pandemic.

It came at the end of another frenetic day as retailers responded to the coronavirus crisis.

Hotel Chocolat and The Works revealed their plans to shutter stores as they bid to combat the spread of the virus.

The chocolatier took the decision over the weekend but will continue to trade online, offering all customers free delivery on their orders.

Hotel Chocolat boss Angus Thirlwell said: “We are geared up to switch fully to online ordering and have added free delivery too via Hotelchocolat.com. More phone lines and remote customer support is being mobilised to make it easier, particularly for some of our elderly customers and who we know don’t do online, to get what they want delivered to their door.

“We hope these measures will ensure Hotel Chocolat can keep serving the community whilst keeping everyone as safe as possible until we’re through this. Thanks for all the support and lovely messages and let’s adapt and innovate together to get through this.”

The Works’ stores will shut from the close of business on March 23 “to encourage social distancing for the safety and wellbeing of its colleagues, customers and the wider community”.

The retailer did, however, report an increase in sales last week despite the decline in high street footfall that has decimated the top lines of its high street neighbours.

The Works registered “a significant uplift in sales” in stores and online, with shoppers buying “products to support with their child’s ongoing education, mindfulness material to support mental health or products to ‘beat the boredom’ during this period of social distancing”.

The business scrapped financial guidance for its financial years ending April 2020 and April 2021 as a result of the upheaval sparked by the coronavirus.