Department store Debenhams is continuing its drive for expansion and is planning to open eight Desire stores by the end of this year. The Group is looking to more than double its number of smaller format Desire stores with a planned five further openings. The first of which will open in Birmingham Fort in September, and three others in Scotland, Wales and northern England will open by the end of the year in a mix of high street, shopping centre and retail p ark locations, according to Drapers.
These follow a 14,000 sq ft store opening in Howgate shopping centre in Falkirk planned for August. Debenhams acquisitions manager Robert Hadfield stated: “The format has been successful and we are confident it can work in different types of locations. We want to open more than one hundred but it depends when and where the opportunities arise. There’s a huge acquisition programme across the Desire stores and the full-size stores.”
Debenhams returned to the stock market last week at 195p per share and its store opening strategy was a key plank of its flotation story. Full-line department stores will open in Frenchgate in Doncaster and Workington in Cumbria this summer as well as its first full-size department store in a retail park in Llandudno, north Wales, in October. Around 25 more store openings are thought to be planned over the next five years. The first Desire store debuted in Truro, Cornwall, last June. Others are in South Shields in south Tyneside and Orpington in Kent.
