A BIG card shop will shut another store today following a string of closures last month.
Clintons will close its branch in Kirkcaldy shopping centre in Fife today (April 8).
It comes after Clintons closed three of its shops in March
It comes after HOAR revealed three stores were set to shut for good earlier this year.
The brand’s store in Whitehaven, Cumbria, closed on Sunday, March 19.
Clintons then closed its store in the Pentagon Centre, Chatham, after the chain decided not to renew its lease, which was due to run out on April 25.
Bolton’s Market Street store was also scheduled to close by the end of March.
The future of the staff who work in affected stores is also uncertain.
HOAR has contacted Clintons to confirm if it plans to shut any more stores in 2023.
Clintons permanently closed three shops last year.
Its Dorchester branch closed on December 29 and a store in Ayr brought the shutters down forever on April 12.
Clintons also shut its remaining store in Market Harborough in January 2022.
The brand was founded in 1968 but it has struggled in recent years due in part to high business rates and a change in people’s shopping habits with people moving online.
The retailer has also struggled to compete with rivals on the high street and online.
Card Factory is its biggest high street rival, as well as online players Moonpig and Funky Pigeon.
Speculation had been raised over the firm’s future when it announced back in 2019 that it urgently needed to close 66 of its sites to avoid collapse.
The firm resolved its woes by entering into what’s known as a “pre-pack administration” back in December 2019.
Clintons brand and its assets – its shops, staff and website – were sold to a new company called Esquire Retail Limited.
But the move still involved hundreds of job losses and store closures.
At its peak before administration, the retailer had 2,500 staff working across 335 shops.
But by January 2022, only 2,000 employees remained and 238 shops were operating.
Nearly 15,000 jobs have been axed since the start of the year as dozens of retailers collapsed or were restructured.
We’ve put together a full list of all the store closures coming this month so you can check if one is closing near you.
