Reports suggest that Arcadia Group has told its landlords that it will exit shops where leases are due to expire or have break clauses during the lease term.
However, the closures might not happen as it remains in talks with property owners about rent terms in the future. Arcadia did not comment. The company has recently furloughed 14,500 employees, making use of the job retention scheme which was created by the UK Government to pay their salaries.
Currently all of the 550 physical shops that Arcadia Group operates are closed due to the UK lockdown, however they have been struggling prior to the crisis and had closed a raft of physical shops in recent periods as it battled falling sales, high rents and crippling business rates. It has been operating under a series of company voluntary arrangement since last year.
