The high street chain wants to double the size of its M&S Food business
High street giant Marks and Spencer has unveiled a wish list of 500 potential sites for new and refurbished food stores. The retailer wants to double the size of its food business in a major expansion that could create thousands of new jobs.
M&S currently operates 330 stores across the UK, but the retailer wants to increase its outlets to have 180 mixed stores and 420 dedicated food shops within the next few years. The ambitious expansion includes 200 potential locations across London.
M&S is also set to launch or renovate 20 stores by April, creating 800 new jobs. That includes a new flagship 83,000 sq ft store at Southgate, Bath which is set to open early next month.
The expansion proposals come as M&S continues its recovery from a devastating cyber attack, which cost it around £324 million. The retail giant is looking to acquire large sites which could stock its full food range. That could mean the average size of its food stores increasing to 18,000 sq ft.
It hopes to target areas without an M&S branch and has highlighted Hove, Marlborough and Wallingford as target locations. Every new store will include the new, larger layout, with wider aisles for bigger trolleys and larger car parks for more families. In Cambridgeshire, Ely, North Cambridge and South Cambridge have been earmarked, as well as Newmarket and Royston.
M&S hopes its expansion will entice more customers away from supermarkets to do their weekly shop in the food hall. More than half of all M&S stores will be transformed to the new format in the next two years. It follows the retailer’s acquisition of 12 Homebase stores last year, after the DIY chain fell into administration.
Those stores will now be transformed into food halls. The first opened in Cannock in December. It is three times the size of the nearby food hall, which closed a day earlier.
Alex Freudmann, Managing Director, M&S Food said: “The strong performance of our new M&S food stores gives us the confidence to explore even more locations across the UK, from Elgin to Exmouth.
“With more than twenty stores opening or modernised before the end of the financial year, we are moving faster.
“Our team want new sites where we could open a large M&S Food store as we deliver on our strategy to bring the right stores to the right places and offer the best shopping experience, range and availability for our customers.”
You can see if any new stores are set to open or if any existing stores are set to be refurbished near you using pur interactive map below.
