‘Whatever next?’ question fans as bargain retailer with 800 branches to shut store in weeks after string of closures

A MAJOR bargain retailer has confirmed it will shut one of its branches for good within weeks amongst a string of store closures. 

One month into the year Iceland has announced another store closure and customers have asked “Whatever next?”

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Iceland will be closing its Speke branch in Liverpool on March 2 much to customers’ dismay. 

Shoppers will now need to head to The Food Warehouse in Speke or surrounding stores in Halewood, Garston and Belle Vale for their frozen food shopping. 

Locals took to Facebook to share their disappointment at the news. 

One user said: “First Klopp now Iceland, whatever next?”

Another said: “So it begins.”

“Bad news,” said someone else.

An Iceland spokesperson said: “We can confirm that the Iceland store located at The Speke Centre, will be closing on Saturday, March 2.

“The Food Warehouse in Speke and our surrounding stores in Halewood, Garston and Belle Vale will continue to operate as normal.”

The supermarket has already announced several closures last year with more to come this year. 

Iceland brought shutters down on its store in the Rosemary Centre, Mansfield in January.

Iceland has also announced that it will close its Southampton store in March.

The supermarket, located on Portswood Road, will close for the final time on Saturday, March 2.

However, it’s not all bad news typically Iceland opens more than 20 new stores each year, with 24 new stores opened in the past year.

Several other retailers have been struggling to get by over the past few years.

Energy costs have risen and more shoppers than ever are choosing to order online rather than head into stores.

This has left some retailers grappling with budgets and having no choice but to close stores to cut costs.

Troubled fashion brand Superdry has said it is looking at various “cost-saving options” after reports it is considering a major restructuring which could include store closures and job cuts.

Homebase closed a store last year leaving it with just 93 stores remaining since it was taken over by Hilco Capital in 2018.

Competitor Poundstretcher closed multiple stores last year but also opened new stores in closed Wilko stores.

Boots revealed it would be closing 300 stores over the next year as part of plans to evolve its brand.

Banks have also announced multiple branch closures.

Barclays is to start pulling the shutters down on 14 sites in England, three in Wales and three in Scotland as soon as April.

Even charity shops are struggling Oxfam confirmed it would close eight of its UK stores last year.

Most supermarket retailers seemed to have braved the storm, with some even announcing new store openings.

Asda opened 21 new locations last month and aims to convert all 470 stores acquired from the Co-op and EG Group in a £438 million deal to Asda Express stores.

Marks and Spencer opened 15 new stores last year and plans to open another three by spring this year.

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This post first appeared on thesun.co.uk