Majestic Wines is the latest retailer to be hit by the changing face of the High Street.
The company, which has 200 Majestic stores, said the number would be reduced – with trading restrained by stiff supermarket competition, weak consumer sentiment and higher costs that have plagued the high street for over a year.
The name Majestic will also disappear from the High Street,being rebranded as Naked Wines, the online business that the Company acquired in 2015 and says that it wants to build new foundations around its more profitable Naked Wines business and ditch the Majestic name.
In a trading statement released this morning, Chief Executive Rowan Gormley said:
“It is clear that Naked Wines has the potential for strong sustainable growth, and we will deliver the best results for our shareholders, customers, people and suppliers by focusing all our energies on delivering that potential.
We also believe that a transformed Majestic business does have the potential to be a long-term winner, but that we risk not maximising the potential of Naked if we try to do both.
Where we have no choice but to close stores we will aim to minimise job losses by migration into Naked.
Therefore we have taken a decision to focus all of our capital and energies into delivering the long-term potential of Naked, and releasing value from Majestic. Our plans for doing this are well advanced, and we look forward to sharing the final details in June.”
