News from the High.Street

Next gave the high street more good news when it raised profit forecasts for the second time in 3 months. Good weather had boosted trade, lifting high street sales by over 2% in the 25 weeks to 18 Jul. Retail sales on Scotland's high streets also showed signs of recovery after months of poor figures.
22 July 2009

Microsoft Windows 7. The most exciting and worthwhile update to Microsoft's operating system is nearly with us. After a poor showing with Vista, Microsoft Windows 7 is now available on pre-order and at a very special price. The offer is only available until midnight on the 9th August with expected delivery by 22nd October 2009. The Microsoft Windows 7 Professional version is also on offer. Both these versions are the European versions and therefore ship without a browser; follow the installation instructions carefully and make sure that you have everything backed up and an Internet browser available on CD or DVD before you start. Microsoft Windows 7 has had some very good reviews with none of the troubles that plagued Vista.
18 July 2009

The recent heatwave has caused many shoppers to stay away from the High Street, resulting in a 5.6% drop in retail sales according to figures released yesterday.
10 July 2009

Primark does however seem to be bucking the trend with a 21% rise in sales in the 16 weeks to 20 Jun. Online sales across the board were down slightly but are holding up better than the high street overall.
10 July 2009

Next have given the high street some good news by announcing better than expected trading and raising their sales forecast. Like-for-like store sales in the 14 weeks to 2nd May were 2.3% lower than a year ago but this was much better than the 6%-9% decline that had been predicted. Caution was still needed but a rise in the directory catalogue business was encouraging.
7 May 2009

Cash for Town Centres. £60million is available to towns to revitalise their centres. The cash is available in Scotland and will help communities fight back against out-of-town developments and the effects of the economic downturn. Local Authorities, community planning partnerships, town-centre managers, chambers of commerce, businesses and voluntary organisations are eligible to apply.
6 May 2009

The British Red Cross, Tiso the outdoor specialists and Warehouse Express, for sound advice on cameras and anything photographic, have all recently joined us on High.St
8 April 2009

Marks & Spencer's Sir Stuart Rose has said trading conditions have stopped getting worse. The signs are tentative and market data is inconsistent but with Easter coming up there is hope that the high street will have a boost this month.
8 April 2009

Woolworths closed the last of its stores on 5 January following a phased shut-down that began on 27th December. The iconic Woolworths survived for 99 years on the high street and will not reappear but the brand name has been sold to the Shop Direct group, owned by the Barclay brothers, and will be relaunched as an Internet site in Summer 2009.
3 February 2009

Marks & Spencer announced that a 1,000 jobs would go, including front-line staff, as a result of lower sales. Adams also announced that following administration 850 jobs would go across the country and some stores would close completely.
6 January 2009

On-line Sales are expected to reach an all time high today. Customers are increasingly turning to the web to do their shopping. Be a part of this revolution and make sure you have a professional web presence. Contact us today
8 December 2008

Woolworths stores will remain open through Christmas even though the company has been taken into administration.
27 November 2008

See our On-line Store for details of voucher codes and special Christmas offers from Borders, Comet, Jessops, Kodak Easyshare, Marks & Spencer (M&S), The Body Shop, The Link, Vodafone and Whittard of Chelsea.
26 November 2008

Woolworths shares were suspended today as this major high street retailer continued with rescue talks.
26 November 2008

Marks & Spencer were leading a pre-Christmas sales push by slashing prices to get shoppers spending on the high street again.
20 November 2008

Tesco have great deals such as the October Magazine deals for wine & the 25% off promotion live at Tesco Digital until 9 Nov 08
24 October 2008

Currys.digital are offering FREE Delivery on all orders over £249 until 7 Nov 08. See our On-line Store for more details.
24 October 2008

Woolworths are offering 10% off all toys until the 31 Oct 08
24 October 2008

The Body Shop are offering 10% off online purchases until 31 Oct 08. See our On-line Store for more details.
24 October 2008

Marks & Spencer reported its worst quarter since Jan-Apr 2005. Consumers concerned about the credit crunch and their savings were turning to cheaper outlets such as Primark and Aldi. M&S said they would not compromise on quality but would cut internal investment and sacrifice some margin to help out customers.
02 October 2008

Thorntons were managing to buck current trends with a seventh consecutive quarter of growth. New products and a brand overhaul had lifted profits by 19.6% to £8.5M.
11 September 2008

Other retailers have not performed quite so well. John Lewis' like-for-like sales were down 1% over the last 6 months to 26 July and operating profit fell by 34% to £40M. Comet experiences plummeting sales of white goods with overall like-for-like sales falling by 9.9% over the last quarter to 31 July. Next suffered a 12% drop in half-year profits and sees no end to the high street's trading woes.
11 September 2008

New offers and discount codes available from Marks & Spencer, The Body Shop, Borders and Vodafone (Including offers on the new Blackberry Bold 9000, Nokia E71 and Nokia E66). See our On-line Store for more details.
2 September 2008

The new Nikon D700 has arrived in Britain. This is one model down from the fabulous Nikon D3 and uses the same super sensor but is more affordable. Available now from Jessops.
25 July 2008

Currys are offering 10% of DAB Radios until 20th Aug.
25 July 2008

Marks & Spencer (M&S), M&Co, Millets and Toys R Us all have Special Summer Offers on at the moment. Take a look.
25 July 2008

Following last month's news of record retail sales it was no surprise that June's figures saw the biggest slump for 22 years. The swings seem more pronounced in the South of the country as retailers in the North of Scotland said figures remain favourable compared with the national average.
24 July 2008

Retail sales in May were up 3.5%, the strongest monthly growth for 22 years. The rise helped boost the annual rate to over 8%, the highest since April 2002. The weather was a contributory factor and shops don't expect to see similar rises in future.
20 June 2008

Tesco has been named as the most valuable brand on the high street. The brand is estimated to be worth £8.6 billion by brand valuation agenct Intangible Business. Marks & Spencer came in at £3.9 billion and Woolworths at a lowly £297 million.
12 May 2008

Stuart Rose has said he will stay at Marks & Spencer until 2011 to see the company through its return to health.
11 March 2008

Healthy January Sales were followed by a weaker February as shoppers tightened their belts in the face of increased food, petrol and mortgage costs.
11 March 2008

Thomson and First Choice, both owned by TUI Travel are to close up to 100 of their high street stores to save costs. The move is not unexpected as 150 travel agents were lost last year when Thomas Cook and MyTravel merged.
30 January 2008

Woolworths is the latest retailer announcing poorer than hoped for Christmas sales in a mixed market. They will be closing their York store this week, reportedly saying high High Street rates were to blame. No real pattern is emerging; some stores like Primark have reported good sales whilst others like M&S were below expectations.
16 January 2008

Monday 3rd December is predicted to be the biggest day of the year for on-line sales as people place their orders in time for delivery before Christmas.
3 December 2007

Good results from Argos helped its parent, Home Retail Group, deliver better than expected results. sales of flat-panel TVs, mobile phones and games consoles were particularly high.
25 October 2007

A poll for the BBC's Working Lunch programme found that 42% of shoppers will do all or most of their Christmas shopping on the high street, 13% would mostly use the Internet and 45% would split their shopping between the two. Whatever you choose to do, www.High.St is there to help.
24 October 2007

Winners in this year's Beautiful Scotland awards include: Aberdeen: city award, Perth: large town award, Forres: medium town award and Alness: small town award. The overall winner was North Berwick with Falkland picking up the Best Village Shield.
20 September 2007

Richard Branson has sold the music store chain Virgin Megastore that he founded 30 years ago and which became a familiar high street name and led to the Virgin Group empire. The stores will be renamed Zavvi. No closures or job losses are expected.
18 September 2007

WH Smith is considering buying the 71 Borders stores in Britain. Borders wants to come out the UK market to concentrate on its US business. The deal may have to be referred to the Competition Commission as the Waterstone's and Ottakar deal was last year.
10 August 2007

Jessops is to close 81 of its 315 high street stores. The announcement follows a couple of profits warnings as more people switch to digital photography.
21 June 2007

Tesco may not get its hands on Dobbies after all. Sir Tom Hunter, whose investment group WCC already owns the Wyevale and Blooms of Bressingham garden-centre chains, has acquired over 25% of Dobbies shares, enough to block the move.
20 June 2007

Tesco surprised everyone by announcing they were buying Dobbies, the garden-centre chain. The move was generally thought to be a good one, with consumers benefiting from Tesco's huge buying power.
9 June 2007

Woolworths said profit margins on the high street were well ahead of last year. Better products and less discounting gave rise to the increase and hopefully indicates the long awaited revival of this iconic brand.
7 June 2007

Marks & Spencer announced their best profits for 9 years, nearly £1bn and up 28% on last year. The results suggest M&S has successfully completed its recovery. Now Stuart Rose is aiming for further growth and expects to create 10,000 jobs over the next 3 years.
23 May 2007

Lloyds TSB should be commended for re-introducing branch telephone numbers. It has taken them a long while to realise that customers don't like call centres and prefer to talk to their branch directly. We hope more businesses follow suit.
3 March 2007

John Lewis are planning to create 35,000 jobs over the next 10 years. More Waitrose stores and 10 department stores are to be added to the company's portfolio.
19 February 2007

Thomas Cook had a third year of record annual profits. Costs were driven down and profit margins rose slightly.
1 February 2007

Marks & Spencer are aiming to be carbon neutral within 5 years. This means sending no material to landfill, reducing food miles (distance from source to shops), using renewable energy and recyclable packaging. Offsetting will be a last resort.
15 January 2007

Christmas sales figures were generally much better than expected. Following forecasts of poor sales and a slow start in December, activity picked up and for some it was a record year. Winners included Marks & Spencer and John Lewis whilst losers included Next and Jessops.
9 January 2007

Shopping centres across the country have reported better sales than last year since they reopened their doors after Christmas. Typically, shops like John Lewis reported 'brisk business'. Canny shoppers are increasingly waiting for the bargains before spending their cash.
28 December 2006

2,500 Post Offices are expected to close by 2009. Looking no further than the end of its nose, the government said losses were to blame and made no consideration of the knock-on affect closures will have on other businesses and to local communities. Instead, Mr Darling suggested basing them in village halls, community centres and pubs!
14 December 2006

Mixed signals on sales figures at the moment. The Office for National Statistics said sales rose faster than expected during November with a 0.3% rise over October. Surveys covering early December showed a fall in the number of people out shopping on the high street, but with more business being done over the Internet than ever before.
14 December 2006

Tesco has again shown strong performance with a 4.4% increase in like-for-like sales for the 3rd Quarter. Overseas expansion continues with 300 new stores due to open in the second half of the year.
6 December 2006

Retail sales on the High Street rose 0.9% in October, 3 times the rate forecast. Is this a sign of early Christmas spending or a counter-reaction to the rise in interest rates?
16 November 2006

Marks & Spencer's pre-tax profits rose 32% to a nine year high. Sales were up in all categories; helped significantly by the 'Your M&S' advertising campaign.
8 November 2006

A petition of 4 million signatures is headed to Downing St to save the humble Post Office. The PO network is under threat from a government that places £s above this bedrock of our high street communities.
18 October 2006

Body Shop bucked the doomster's predictions after the takeover by L'Oreal in March by increasing like-for-like sales by 8.8% over the summer.
14 October 2006

Carphone Warehouse has lost its deal to supply Vodafone contract phones. Other manufacturers are expected to fill the gap so both parties would appear to lose out.
13 October 2006

Sainsbury's said its recovery was going well; with like-for-like sales over the past 16 weeks up 6.6%.
11 October 2006

Instances of shoplifting have risen by 70% over the last 6 years according to the British Retail Consortium Retail Crime Survey. Soft penalties and poor enforcement were partly to blame.
11 October 2006

A chilling thought. Tesco stores are using the heat from your body to determine how many people are shopping and hence how many till points to open.
9 October 2006

MFI intend selling their 362 shop outlets to Merchant Equity Partners for £1, subject to shareholder approval. MFI will continue manufacturing flat-pack furniture under the name Galiform.
22 September 2006

VAT fraud reportedly cost taxpayers £8.4billion during the period Jun 05 to Jun 06 said the BBC's Panorama programme. This massive loss is five times that of any other European country and four times more than the Treasury is aware of.
21 September 2006

Next, the high street clothes retailer, performed strongly today on news of a possible, albeit unlikely, takeover bid. The 4% increase moved Next to the top of the FTSE 100 leaderboard.
9 September 2006

Scottish High Streets benefited from a sunny July and good tourism with a 2.8% increase in sales over the same period last year.
16 August 2006

More goods than ever are being sent by post. High street items sold over the Internet, including alcohol and food, have contributed to 5 billion more packages being sent over the last 10 years.
9 August 2006

Interest rates went up 0.25% today.
3 August 2006

The Government Commission for Integrated Transport has recommended parking charges be introduced at out-of-town shopping areas to level the playing field with the High Street shops. We say, vary the high street car park charges, starting at£0-00, to reflect the varying demand throughout the day and week. This is no different to paying extra on the trains to travel during the rush hour and would bring people back to our town centres during the quiet periods whilst still providing revenue to car park operators.
20 July 2006

Internet sales in the UK are higher than anywhere else in Europe and have experienced a massive growth of 51% since 2004. We'd like to think friendly sites like High.St are partly responsible!
19 July 2006

£125million is being lost by consumers who fail to claim the rewards from high street store loyalty cards and credit cards. 90% of us have at least one of theses cards so most of us are effected.
17 July 2006

Independent High Street shops and staff welcomed the news this week that the government had decided not to let the big stores extend their Sunday opening hours from the 10am to 4pm currently permitted.
6 July 2006

Shopper numbers on the high street declined by nearly 20% during the England / Ecuador football match. This is expected to fall further during the game with Portugal on Saturday. Must be a good time to browse the shops on www.High.St !
24 June 2006

Cadbury Dairy Milk products have been recalled from high street shelves after a very small risk of salmonella was identified following discovery of a leaking pipe at one factory.
27 June 2006

The Link chain, already partly owned by O2, will be fully subsumed into the O2 group to make it the second largest high street mobile phone retailer after Carphone Warehouse.
21 June 2006

HMV, who also own Waterstones will be buying Ottakar's after months of speculation. Ottakar's sales had been declining in the face of supermarket and Internet competition so this take-over was considered a fair deal.
31 May 2006

Vodafone announced losses of £14.9bn, a UK record. One-off costs accounted for most of the loss and, excluding these, Vodafone made a profit. 400 jobs are to be cut and there are challenges but the business is healthy said a spokesman.
30 May 2006

Tesco said all its carrier bags would be bio-degradable by September and aimed to reduce consumption by 25% over the next 2 years.
11 May 2006

French Connection issued its third consecutive profits warning after a 2% fall in like-for-like sales since January. A controversial advertising blitz had not helped.
10 May 2006

Tesco reported a 17% rise in profits this year to £2.25bn. £100m is to be invested in environmental technology.
25 April 2006

Sales on the High Street for the first quarter were down but March saw growth of 0.7%. Hopefully a sign of better times to come.
25 April 2006

Dixons is to rebrand all its High Street stores as 'Currys.digital'. The Dixons name will be retained for the Internet trading side of the business.
5 April 2006

Jessops saw like-for-like sales in the first quarter of 2006 rise by 2.6% and were upbeat as digital camera sales had been strong.
31 March 2006

Boots sales were up 3.3% in the final quarter and Sainsbury's recovery was also above expectations; however, Woolworths said it was still finding trading tough on the high street.
30 March 2006

Ottakar's takeover by HMV was approved by the Competition Commission who said that book prices were unlikely to change due to the presence of on-line retailers like Amazon. Strange, we thought HMV also owns Waterstones and www.waterstones.co.uk takes you to the Amazon site!
30 March 2006

Dame Anita Roddick has agreed to sell the The Body Shop chain to L'Oreal in a multi-million pound deal. Dame Anita said the Body Shop's ethics would not change and L'Oreal pledged to retain the brand and run the company independently.
18 March 2006

John Lewis made a pre-tax profit of £252M last year, 10% higher than last year. Staff will share in the profits as reward for their hard work through a generally difficult period for retailers.
10 March 2006

High Street shops won a small victory today. Supermarket dominance is to be investigated after reports of some items being sold at below cost price and land banking to deter rivals.
9 March 2006

An all party group of MPs have published their report, 'High Street Britain: 2015' in which they recommend the setting up of a retail regulator to prevent the erosion of the high street and our 'social glue'. Comment. We don't think regulation will work, what is needed is for the Government to level the playing field. For years town centre business rates have been a golden goose for councils but in today's climate these disproportionate charges suck the life blood out of small businesses and create a huge barrier to new businesses. High Streets could be revitalised if shops in the heart of our town didn't pay a premium over out-of-town, mainly large store, developments. Lower rates would allow businesses to compete more favourably on price and maintain the social glue of our communities.
15 February 2006

John Lewis has been voted shopper's favourite store after several years in the runner up slot. In it's wake were: Waitrose, TK Maxx and Matalan, with last year's favourite Ikea in fifth and Amazon in sixth.
23 January 2006

Tesco reported strong growth and record sales for the Christmas period. Price cuts were good for Tesco shoppers but were met with dismay by high street shops who struggle to compete.
18 January 2006

Good News has been reported for the High Street over Christmas. Several stores, such as John Lewis, M&S, Jessops and fatface, reported increased sales. Many thought it the best festive trading in 4 years.
10 January 2006

A leaked report by MPs suggests that if supermarkets continue to expand at their current rate the corner shop will be history by 2015. www.High.St continues to support our traditional high street and small shops in particular by offering them an affordable web presence. Contact us for more details.

Next expects profits to be better than expected following some strong Christmas trading.
4 January 2006

Shops reported strong sales in the week up to Christmas and this continued on Boxing Day but the cold weather then seems to have put off shoppers resulting in a 12% fall in sales for the full week following Christmas Day.
3 January 2006

High street stores are facing greater competition from the Internet this year. Fuelled by an increase in broadband, nearly two in 5 of us will buy some Christmas presents from the web compared with one in 5 in 2001. Of course www.High.St continues to provide the best solution whichever way you prefer to shop!
9 December 2005

The cold weather is thought to have been partly responsible for the first rise in monthly retail sales for 8 months. The modest rise in November is welcome but overall sales from September to end November were still down slightly on 2004.
6 December 2005

The Microsoft Xbox 360 was launched in Europe today amongst criticism of faults and supply shortages. Amazon customers in particular were unhappy that machines had not been delivered but the problem is widespread.
5 December 2005

John Lewis reported a 5.8% increase in sales over the same period last year for the week to 19 November, the fifth week of growth. Aberdeen was the leading store with nearly a 15% increase.
26 November 2005

Work is set to start on a project to turn Aberdeen into one of the UK's top shopping destinations. The Union Square complex will be complete in 2007 and could be followed with the Bon Accord Quarter by 2010; linking the Bon Accord and St Nicholas centres.
24 November 2005

M&S have signed a new agreement with George Davies, the man behind the Per Una range, just one month after he announced his resignation. The group also announced a 19.6% rise in half year profits and said it would speed up its store modernisation programme.
8 November 2005

Primark revealed a 12% rise in annual profits, bucking the general trend on th high street. Primark have 122 shops across the country selling fashion clothing at low prices.
9 November 2005

Matalan reported a 6.3% drop in like-for-like high street sales in the 6 months to the end of August and expected conditions would remain difficult.
2 November 2005

JD Sports has bought all:sports for £18m. all:sports went into administration last month and has since made 1,300 staff redundant. JD Sports will keep some stores and take on the company's debt.
31 October 2005

The John Lewis store in Aberdeen continued to be the group's best performing store with strong sales compared with the same period last year.
12 October 2005

M&S reported a welcome rise in overall sales for the 12 weeks to 1 October but there was only a marginally increase in clothing. The previous 7 quarters had all seen falls. M&S and George Davies, the man originally behind the Per Una range, failed to reach a new contractual agreement but the line will continue.
11 October 2005

Sales of Harry Potter have exceeded 300 million across high streets worldwide. The books have been translated into 63 languages.
5 October 2005

Boots and Alliance Unichem have announced their intention to merge. The merger is subject to approval from the Competition Commission and will give the new company 15% of the UK pharmacy market.
3 October 2005

Boots stated that they are not expecting a significant improvement in sales later in the year. This affected their share price and was partially responsible for a subdued days trading on the stock market.
29 September 2005

M&S sales of the Per Una brand have been good but, despite buying full control of the brand last year, they may part company with the brand's founder, George Davies, if he demands an excessive share of the returns.
26 September 2005

High Street sales continue to be poor this summer. Nearly a half of the retailers report worse figures than last summer with only a quarter saying sales volumes are better. The CBI said the outlook remains bleak.
30 August 2005

Ottakar's the bookstore may be sold. There is interest from its own management, who want to take it private, and HMV, which owns Waterstone's.
26 August 2005

The Royal Mail will charge postage on size as well as weight from September 2006. Whilst big light packages will be more expensive to post, small heavier objects will cost less. The Royal Mail will not make any extra profit from the change and there will be no price difference for 70% of mail.
18 August 2005

Dixons has decided to stop selling 35mm film cameras after nearly 70 years. The popularity of digital cameras has led to the decision.
8 August 2005

Time and Tiny computer stores and others supplied by Granville Technology have been closed from today following the collapse of the parent company. High Street computer sales are now ruled by PCWorld and the small independents although mail order remains a good option for buyers.
27 July 2005

Scotland's High Streets are doing better than those in England. The latest monthly figures show Scotland had an increase of 2.4% over the same period last year. One reason given for the better figures is the more stable house prices across Scotland.
20 July 2005

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince broke all records and sold more than 9 million copies in the first 24 hours of its launch.
18 July 2005

Associated British Foods (ABF) is to buy 120 Littlewoods stores. Some will become Primark shops but others will be sold off to other High Street retailers.
12 July 2005

Tesco continue to increase their share of the market. Mainly at the expense of Morrisons, Tesco now has over a 30% share.
30 June 2005

The high street had more bad news yesterday following a CBI survey that showed the biggest fall in sales since records began 22 years ago. The position appears worse due to strong sales in June 2004 but is still not good news. Many shops have started their summer sales early and a drop in interest rates is hoped for.
30 June 2005

Amazon is the public's favourite on-line retailer for customer satisfaction, price, purchase process and site performance. Shoppers are increasingly turning to the Internet to research prices and buy online according to the IMRG. There is no better time to have the best of both worlds by regularly visiting www.High.St
25 May 2005

New Look is the third largest retailer of ladies fashions in UK with profits before interest and tax up by around 40% this year. Unlike beleaguered Marks & Spencer whose full year pre-tax profit fell by 19%.
24 May 2005

William Hill is now the biggest bookmakers on the high street after the purchase of 624 outlets from Stanley at £504m.
16 May 2005

100 high street bank branches, including 60 Clysesdale and 40 Yorkshire bank branches are being closed by their parent company, the National Australia Bank.
11 May 2005

Sales on the high street during April were the worst for 10 years. The early Easter holiday break in March, election uncertainties and weak house sales, which in turn have led to a reduced demand for consumer products are thought to be contributory factors.
10 May 2005

Specsavers the high street opticians plan to double the number of outlets providing their Hearcare range of hearing aids to 100 this year.
2 May 2005

WH Smith half-year profits to 28 February have leapt 32% compared with the same period last year. This is welcome news for the 667 High Street outlets.
21 April 2005

Index are to close 126 of its stores and sell a further 33 to rival Argos. 93 outlets in department stores will disappear and the floor space returned to Littlewoods. Up to 3,200 jobs could be lost. The move has come after 18 years of losses.
17 April 2005

Woolworths shares plunged 25% yesterday after Apax Partners dropped their bid.
15 April 2005

No buyer has been found for the Gadget Shop chain so remaining stores will now have to close with the loss of 620 jobs.
15 April 2005

Tesco profits have risen again and broken through the £2bn mark, a first for any UK retailer. Almost one in three shoppers spend money in Tesco supermarkets and the store's range of CDs, electrical products and clothing have contributed to declining sales for other high street shops.
12 April 2005

Marks & Spencer experienced another drop in like-for-like sales over the last quarter. Other retailers have also reported difficult trading conditions on the high street.
12 April 2005

Ottakar's pre-tax profits for the last financial year to 29 Jan 05 were up 16%. Unfortunately sales were down 1.6% in the first 7 weeks of 2005 compared with this time last year.
29 March 2005

Jessops shares slumped after the company issues a profits warning due primarily to poor sales of digital cameras.
21 March 2005

Jenners, the oldest department store in Britain has been sold to the House of Fraser.
21 March 2005

Gadget Shop, with 65 High St outlets is going into administration. However, the reasons are not thought to be financial but due to boardroom differences. Therefore, there are hopes that the chain can be sold as a going concern.
14 March 2005

Boots Finance Director has resigned, 2 weeks after the company issued a profits warning.
14 March 2005

The Bank of England left interest rates at 4.75% for the seventh month in a row despite some concerns about the continuing rise in house prices.
10 March 2005

Boots the Chemist saw its shares fall by 4% on the news of lower than expected annual profits. Trading since a good Christmas period has been slow and Boots continues to lose business to the supermarkets.
1 March 2005

Online shopping has reached record highs with £1 in every £7 now being spent on goods delivered to the door. Websites like High.St provide the best of both worlds.
21 February 2005

Supermarkets across the country have been removing food products that could contain an illegal dye. The Food Standards Agency has advised people not to eat foods that may have been contaminated. Products from all supermarkets from Asda to Waitrose are affected. A full list of foods can be found on the FSA website (list now removed).
18 February 2005

Debenhams is to buy eight stores from the collapsed High Street retailer Allders. All eight are located in the South of England.
14 February 2005

Amazon took over 100,000 advance orders in the first 24 hours for the new Harry Potter book due out in July. Order you copy of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince from Amazon.
10 February 2005

Ikea's new store in North London closed 30 minutes after opening following a surge in customers, many pushing in front of people who had queued overnight. Six people were taken to hospital. Ikea was deeply shocked, upset and concerned.
10 February 2005

Barclays published record profits today. This rise of 20% to £4.6bn was in line with expectations.
10 February 2005

The High Street Sales failed to make up for the poor showing by many stores over the Christmas period. Sales were up on the same period last year but by just 0.5%. Shoppers were particularly reluctant to buy bigger ticket items, such as furniture.
8 February 2005

An ICM survey for Retail Week found that 40% were quite worried about the expansion of supermarkets at the expense of High Street shops and a further 19% were very worried.
6 February 2005

Ann Summers now have a turnover of £110m from their 117 High Street shops. Ann Summers favour the term 'Pleasure Retailer' and shoppers are certainly less coy about going through the doors.
1 February 2005

Woolworths shares shot up on talk of a possible offer from Apax Partners, the private equity group.
1 February 2005

ONS figures indicated that the 2004 Christmas sales on the High Street were the worst since 1981 but the picture is mixed. Volume was up and non-seasonally adjusted numbers were comparable with 2003. For every retailer saying sales were down, another was reporting an increase.
22 January 2005

Boots festive sales were up 2.6%. WH Smith experienced a 2% drop in its High Street stores but overall profitability for the year is up.
19 January 2005

Tesco and HMV both reported strong sales over the holiday period. Tesco's like-for-like sales, excluding petrol, increased by 7.6% whilst HMV's sales were ahead of expectations at 6.4%.
18 January 2005

Tesco have announced that they will open their first non-food store this year. No location or date have been given and Tesco said it was too early to say if further non-food stores would follow.
17 January 2005

Online shopping sales increased 6 times faster than did the rest of the High Street this Christmas. The UK public, helped by Broadband, is now realising the benefits envisaged, but not experienced, by many in the dot com era. There isn't a better time to join www.High.St than right now!
15 January 2005

Interest rates remain at 4.75% this month.
13 January 2005

Dixons reported a 2% rise in Christmas sales in better news from the High Street.
13 January 2005

High Street sales figures during December were the worst for 10 years, say the British Retailer Consortium. Food and drink held up but most other areas were down but not by as much as some predicted. Total sales actually increased by 2.5% but the like-for-like sales, which excludes new stores, were 0.4% down.
11 January 2005

The High Street retailer Marks & Spencer has said like-for-like sales were down 5.6% over the Christmas period. They expect annual pre-tax profits to be lower than most analysts had been predicting.
7 January 2005

Ottakar's saw a like-for-like sales rise of 2.2% over Christmas but this was lower than the 3.5% rise seen over the second half of 2004. Shares fell 13% following a profit warning.
6 January 2005

Laura Ashley's chief executive has followed the co-chief exec in stepping down from the company.
6 January 2005

Next also suggested its annual profit will be down following slow end-of-year sales figures. Shares in the High Street retailer fell 3% on the news.
5 January 2005

Woolworths reported disappointing sales in the run up to Christmas; particularly of toys and DVDs. In contrast New Look increased sales by nearly 19% in the last 14 weeks of the year over the same period in 2003.
5 January 2005

HSBC returned to near normality today after many customers had problems withdrawing cash from high st dispensers and using their credit cards yesterday. The website was still giving some problems earlier today but this was probably due to heavy demand said a spokesperson.
4 January 2005

Cupar in Fife has been added today.
30 December 2004

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is due to be in High street shops from 16 July 2005. Buy from Amazon.
29 December 2004

Tesco continues to go from strength to strength and now has a record 28.7% share of the grocery sector. Asda and Sainsbury had minor gains whilst Morrisons/Safeway appears to be the main loser this month.
17 December 2004

Interest rates will remain at 4.75% for the fourth month in a row. Good news for everyone on the High St!
9 December 2004

Supplies on the High Street of Sony's Playstation 2 have been held up by a shipping log jam in the Suez Canel. Sony are flying in additional supplies so machines will be filtering through to the high street.
6 December 2004

The Incredibles is set to be the Number 1 Christmas movie on the High St this Christmas. Just released in the UK, The Incredibles is another great film from the Disney Pixar studios.
4 December 2004

The UK reached its highest level of visits to Internet online retail sites this week. High Street retailers have all seen big increases, Argos, Tesco, Comet, Currys and Woolworths have all boosted their market share within the retail sector by 40% since October.
1 December 2004

There are some reports that Retailers are facing a tough Christmas and may have to start their sales early to reach their sales targets. The shops look busy enough to us and there are few signs of significant discounts. Late Christmas shoppers may benefit but don't hold your breath and keep watching this space!
27 November 2004

The VCR is dead! Long live DVD! Today Dixons announced that it was ending the sale of VCRs, probably before Christmas. New systems that record to a hard disc or DVD are also proving popular and are much more flexible than the old VCR.
22 November 2004

Clinton Cards is buying rival Birthdays Group for £46.4million in cash. Birthdays has about 500 stores across UK high streets which will be added to Clinton's 800 outlets.
18 November 2004