To feel sad Debenhams is going?

[CrotchBurn]

Don't know why but it just makes me feel nostalgic
www.bbc.com/news/business-55793411

Sad for the job losses but not surprised. Our local stores were quite dull. I like Mantaray and Maine and hope they continue somewhere, but they didn’t innovate either.

[quote BobbinThreadbare123]@ErrolTheDragon they had a mini-Liverpool One planned out for Preston a good few years back, with JL as the pivotal store. IIRC, JL pulled out and the whole thing got scrapped. So they put in some weird pavements without crossings and went down the different route with the shops. Seems to be working out OK for them. People have a lot of bad things to say about Preston but it's weathered the storm reasonably well.[/quote]
The pavements are nice but with no Debenhams I'm struggling to think of anything I could get there now which wouldn't be more easily done at deepdale. Maybe Cotswold and mountain warehouse vs Go Outdoors. (Smaller clothes shops are useless for petites IME. )That's a big part of the problem - city centres with parking charges need a real 'pull'.

@SCALPHELP

I agree all good if you have a local store. I live in Cumbria , so those shops do not exist here.

I like Mantaray and Maine and hope they continue somewhere

This is exactly what Boohoo have bought. The brand names. What did you think they paid >£500m for if they weren’t taking the staff, the stock or the stores?

However, if the brand goes the same way as Karen Millen under Boohoo’s ownership, I wouldn’t be banking on natural fibres or quality.

I don't know what they did to them but i've never been in a debenhams toilet that wasn't awful...even after a refit!
(although most MN won't know this as they only use the toilet once a month and never outside their own home! )

My town in Bedfordshire only had Debenhams after M&S closed its modern, large store a couple of years ago so if I want a bra fitting appointment now I'd have to go to Milton Keynes or St Albans. My shopping centre is looking pretty empty as we also lost Monsoon and Next, which is now entirely out of town.

I liked our store and am gutted that Boohoo have bought it as I loathe that company. It''s interesting that after all the hoo-ha last year of their using sweatshops in Leicester that it hasn't dented their profits at all.

I will miss their bras. It is the only place I have bought bras for the last nearly 20 years. I loved that being a bigger size didn't mean that I had to have a horrible white bra and that I didn't have to pay beyond stupid money for large sizes. M&S bras just aren't as good imo.

@1moreglassplease

My town in Bedfordshire only had Debenhams after M&S closed its modern, large store a couple of years ago so if I want a bra fitting appointment now I'd have to go to Milton Keynes or St Albans. My shopping centre is looking pretty empty as we also lost Monsoon and Next, which is now entirely out of town.

I liked our store and am gutted that Boohoo have bought it as I loathe that company. It''s interesting that after all the hoo-ha last year of their using sweatshops in Leicester that it hasn't dented their profits at all.

I am amazed too about boo hoo. Im probably way behind the times but I associate them with really cheap and nasty clothes aimed at skinny teenagers and twenty somethings.

gutted that Boohoo have bought it as I loathe that company. It''s interesting that after all the hoo-ha last year of their using sweatshops in Leicester that it hasn't dented their profits at all.

Well, the desire for very cheap clothes does tend to obscure inconvenient stories about sweatshops, doesn’t it?

Genuinely, how do people think that a dress (or a tracksuit at the moment) is made and sold for less than £10?

There is an interesting parallel with the desire for free parking in city centres. I’m curious about how much people really want city centre stores and a varied shopping experience when so many people complain about having to pay to park. If city centre parking were free and to hell with the environment etc., I suppose that there would be complaints about too much traffic!

It wasn't just last year. That was second or third time for boohoo. The only reason why everyone was up in arms for 10 minutes, instead of the usual 2, was because it affected not just the workers as the virus spread🤷🏻

But where are we going to buy party dresses from? Could guarantee that they would deliver, for a black tie event. Spose it's coast these days.

Coast's quality is utter shite now since they've bought out! The options are diminishing.

My husband has worked at Bullring Debenhams for 17 years and will be made redundant after the stock clearance, are we sad, yes, we are worried about finances etc, we know that he will probably have to apply to the Government for his redundancy as Debenhams are in liquidation, and we will probably have to apply for Universal Credit, he has worked there since the Branch opened, straight from college so hasn’t had a variety of experience in other jobs but he does have transferable skills so hopefully this will help in his search for another job, he is also shielded as he has underlying health conditions so this may impact on his ability to look for work straight away.
Was it a surprise about Debenhams, not really, they haven’t adapted to the current market for some time.

Without Debenhams, Topshop, Dorothy Perkins, Miss Selfridge there will barely be anything left in our town.That said I do virtually all my shopping online even pre-covid and that is the problem

I think Coast are another Boohoo owned brand now! Which accounts for its drop in quality.

Cheap, clingy shit poorly made.

Plus If I’m buying an occasion dress I ideally want to see it ‘in the flesh’ which is becoming increasingly difficult.

It should be mandatory to retain a % of staff/stock/real estate in these deals for a period of time.

All those clothes and hardware that will likely be destroyed. How wasteful and detrimental to the environment.

I agree with @Iamthewombat - when a company is put up for sale, either in entirety or in parts - those buying it have got to be able to make it work. If the deal on the table is unworkable, in that the company will still be weighed down with such debts and liabilities that they'll never make a go of it, then no-one will touch the sale with a bargepole. Insolvency processes are sometimes controversial in that they allow debts/liabilities to be wiped off but, while it can be morally dubious, it does allow the company to survive. Something being better than nothing.

With regards the stock, no it won't be thrown away. Liquidators need to get the best return for creditors - all those owed money by the company, whether that's banks, employees, HMRC, suppliers - and they will sell it on for the highest price. Even if it goes for rags it'll be sold, but mostly it will be reclaimed by suppliers who haven't been paid yet under Retention of Title laws, or it'll get sold to discount chains.

Problem is, there's more nostalgia than actual shopping going on.

Yup. It was the same with Woolworths - everyone rung their hands about pick'n'mix or spending pocket money on cassette tapes but very few people actually shopped there. The bottom line was the business hadn't kept up with the times and they were seen as an increasingly bad risk. Credit risk insurers pulled their cover (this being insurance for suppliers who give goods on credit, insuring the risk of a company going bust and therefore the supplier not being paid) because the company was in such a bad shape and then it was all over bar the nostalgia.

I'm in Ireland, and feel sorry for the staff, but it was so overpriced. The exchange rate was atrocious at the best of times.

*wrung, not rung!

I feel sorry for the staff but I don't think I've ever bought anything in there other than cosmetics. Unfortunately I think department stores have had their day.

I feel nostalgic for a proper High Street, not for Debenhams who have been running on empty for years. One that was not a proliferation of identical shops selling polyester tat. I think the High Street is now dead as a destination and nothing will bring it back in the way it was years ago, not in the recent past.

I think the way to go, if you have the budget, is to buy less but buy at quality retailers rather than the tat pedlars. Shops like Primark have their place but they started the High Street rot, shops dumbed down their quality to match the Primark and New Looks.

I am sure posters will say my attitude is snobby, I do realise that people are cash strapped, but the pile 'em high, sell 'em cheap model phas fundamentally changed the way we shop (and spawned a lot of instagrammers who also peddle consumerism) - people buy too much because it is cheap and fashion is disposable. We buy the most disposable fashion in Europe. If something positive that comes out of the pandemic is the realisation that we don't need to keep buying tat.

I’m sad about this for the staff who have lost their jobs. I fucking hate Boohoo, their dominance, the way they treated their staff during the pandemic, no one is making them accountable. Plus the clothes are cheap and nasty. I only shop online now out of necessity but I get none of the joy that I used to when shopping. Click, buy, yawn. None of the pleasure of a day out, browsing in shops, seeing what colours and textures actually look and feel like, not too mention actually being able to try clothes, rather than ordering several sizes and then sending them back, which is ridiculously time consuming and expensive. I think if the high street goes we will lose more than just shops, but employment (largely women), community and exercise.

Unfortunately it was a bit of an anachronism which hadn't really kept up. I'm in my early 30s and I remember going in there all the time with my mum when I was younger. As a teen we stopped going to much. I couldn't tell you the last time I went. My memories of it are quite odd - dated, tatty, the clothes and everything were cheap but priced expensively. It seemed like a strange place lost in time to be honest!

I do feel for the staff who will lost jobs, but then there will be many livelihoods that the arrival of large department stores destroyed back in the day - it's the cycle of things, as hard as it is.

We're at a strange and pivotal place in terms of our consumerism I feel. We continually demand cheaper clothes but then we want quality as well. We demand ethical and green products but will turn a blind eye to poor practices for the sake of a cheap dress, which we will then chuck away within a year.

I can see how it's difficult for companies to tread the line.

I'd like to see more choices of good independents on high streets, rather than ugly cookie cutter buildings full of the same W H Smiths or J D Sports or Primarks or T K Maxxs. But unfortunately rates are ridiculously high in many places and small shops can't afford them.

Deary me, so many typos! Lose, not lost etc etc.

I'm not, I worked there at 16 and they're so badly ventilated in some locations you'd feel faint in summer.

Plus the management were obnoxious.

All anecdotal ofc.

It will be desperately sad for smaller provincial towns where Debenhams was often the flagship store in retail developments. It will be impossible to fill that retail space and will just hasten the decay of many town centres.

However, I feel no nostalgia for the brand. I remember when I was younger and and a bit scruffier and poorer being looked down upon by the orange army of beauty counter staff, who made it a mission to ignore anyone who didn't look like them. Once I got older and richer I couldn't then think of anything worse than going into their badly lit hell to be fawned upon.

I hated the physical building. Too hot, stuffy and the perfumes were so overwhelming. Fun christmas presents.

I really liked designers at debenhams. Got dh a really lovely coat and my dress for grad ball.