M&S continues to reshape store estate with new fashion and food locations

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
Oct 17, 2019

The news stories around M&S may largely focus on its store closure plans, but the UK retail giant is continuing to open new locations and on Thursday it announced its latest opening plan. A 60,000 sq ft clothing and food store will debut next summer at British Land’s Giltbrook Retail Park in Nottingham.

 

It’s part of M&S’s efforts to reshape its store estate “to reflect how consumers shop, with stores designed to suit busy family life.”

The announcement comes less than two weeks before the company opens a major new store in Cornwall – its first clothing store opening in the South West for 10 years. 

Both locations are part of its store transformation plan and its wider plan to improve its fashion turnover. Also included in this is its aim to grow clothing e-sales to a third of its total, supported by its network of over 1,000 stores, where 70% of online orders are already collected.
 
The new Nottingham store is “being designed to appeal to M&S’s target of busy families,” it explained, “so M&S chose the retail park because of its extensive, free parking with 2,300 spaces and the right store and leisure facilities mix including cafes, restaurants, major retailers and a children’s playground.”

The click & collect point will be easily accessible and the store will offer “contemporary, easy-to-wear clothing across all categories.” It will “complement M&S’s existing Nottingham town centre offering.”

The company said that the location is an area it has been looking to open in for several years. Giltbrook Retail Park is easily accessible to customers in both Derby & Nottingham – areas that have a combined population of 750,000 people and that are the biggest populations in the UK not served by an out of town M&S store already. It also offers a prime accessible destination park just 1.5 miles from J26 on the M1.