BHS has the same problem as Littlewoods - seen as a bit dull & untrendy for middle aged and older folk.

I think it's more to do with presentation, as their stuff are decent quality. They could do well with an image makeover. And emphasise 'British' in BHS

Nobody in retail ought to follow Woolworths' example..

Many older people tend to have fewer big financial commitments (little or no mortgage, young children, etc.) and thus have more money to spend. Also they are now from generations where fashion was important and do not want to be faced with acres of cardigans, 'safe' colours, and poor quality, cheap fabrics. John Lewis, Debenhams, etc. have a much better ranges of quality, fashionable clothing in well laid out, attractive-to -visit stores. We are also still benefitting from final salary pensions so, in essence, many are quite well off ( as shown by the numbers taking cruises and overseas holidays!).

BHS seemed to get itself stuck in a time-warp. My impression was that its strategy was 'once you get to 55+ it is all over and customers want to slide into an invisible and dreary old age'. Last time I visited BHS, it was a most depressing experience, shabby and unloved. There are so many shops nowadays catering almost solely for young people wanting cheap and quickly changing fashions; BHS made the fundamental mistake of not looking closely at the older generations and providing them with goods they wanted, and had the money , to buy.

The other thing to consider is that a 48 year old in the 1980s is very different from todays 48 year old. People are living longer, staying healthier for longer, and also staying younger for longer in many cases.

Not everybody hits 45 and thinks "right time for slippers, pipe and cardigans"

and that leaves people over 60 - 65 who have to think about retirement, pensions, growing food prices and austerity, and who also know the value of life and don't want to splash out on materialism, and who would rather save for retirement, spend money on experiences & holidays in their last healthy mobile days.

It wasn't cutting it anywhere!

I can't imagine either of my parents shopping for clothes at BHS. My mum is nearly 70 and my step dad is 70 but neither of them would be seen dead in most of BHS' offerings.

Just because you get older doesn't mean you want to dress in beige acrylics. You don't want to be a fashion victim, and stuff designed for people in their 20s isn't going to look great on you, but at the same time the older generations now generally were teens in the 1960s when fashion, music, and pop culture all boomed. They're not the same as previous older generations who essentially went from childhood to middle age.

They're also financially better off (generally) so can afford to get better quality. My parents favourite shop is Harvey Nichols in Bristol, and places like John Lewis. I'm not really sure who BHS is trying to aim at really. They're not cheap, cheap, so don't have the value shoppers who go to Primark etc

Have to agree. I am over 60 and shop in East, Monsoon (both especially during the sales!), as well as the better dept stores, plus some very individual online companies.

There are also some very good catalogue companies offering a wide range of clothing aimed at older customers which have the added advantage of not having to trail around the shops, carrying heavy bags, with easy returns policies, etc. Despite what some think, older people grew up struggling with the complexities of DOS and dreadfully slow internet, and are now quite computer competent, and thus more than happy to shop online especially for basics. BHS simply did not address the needs of its changing customer demographics.

A big, empty store.

The 11,000 BHS jobs that could potentially go, would totally dwarf the 4,400 steel industry jobs that are on the line.

So what are the chances of the Government getting as 'involved' in saving BHS?

"High Street retailer British Home Stores (BHS) has filed for administration, putting 164 shops and almost 11,000 jobs at risk.

The administrators Duff & Phelps will now try to find a buyer for all or part of the 88-year old business, but in the meantime BHS will continue to trade.

They said BHS had "no alternative but to put the group into administration".

If a buyer is not found, it would be the biggest High Street collapse since Woolworths."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-36123444

Sad to hear

I hate it when this thread crops back up, place I worked 17 years is in there, really bad part of my life.

Isn't this that Phillip Green bloke who shifted the cash out of BHS to his wife in Monaco?

Well he has very imaginative tax arrangements which are more than questionable but he actually wrote off a loan that BHS owed Arcadia (any money to Monaco is more connected with tax than company money that would have remained with the company ) and is still owed money by them, the new owners however last year when it was already in trouble took out a loan of £8.4 million from the company

It didn't help that when the HQ was sold 50% of the proceeds went to Green

In Stratford upon Avon? I very much doubt it. I wouldn't be surprised to see our current Debenhams relocate into it as the are redeveloping the area next to the current Debenhams store, with that empty I can see them knocking that all through.

Real classy comment.

Yeah, Green was the hired help, as in BHS hired him, and then he helped himself to £400 million from the company and its pension fund. Looks like Green did a Maxwell.

he and his family received the £400 million as dividends , it did initially do very well after he bought it. How those dividends were paid and the tax avoidance is questionable though.

I feel that way right now as slippers keeps your socks cleaner than walking about the carpets only in your socks. That and the fact losing so much weight I've felt the need for slippers and a top on nowadays. Granted it is getting better with the warmer weather.

I think Green has figured that out to get his hands on the money, one of the reasons he lives on his big boat in tax heaven Monaco, and he is going to have an even bigger boat soon i.e 'Lionheart'.

This made me lol. There are around 200,000 books published each year in the UK alone, the global figure is 4-5 times that. I'd be surprised if even 10% of them are made into films or tv shows.

And film or tv as a medium is as different from literature as sculpture is from ballet.

Whenever these things happen why do they always find some poor staff member to hound?

That lady trying to get in to door on BBC news is close to tears but they keep prodding her with silly questions like "how do you feel?" "what will you do now?".

I'm not sure what that kind of thing adds to the story, it's just making that woman feel 100 times worse. I'd have kept totally quiet if I was her, just to make them piss off.

Legally he isn't the tax exile, he is registered here but any time he buys a property or company he then within 24 hours puts it in his wife's name and she is resident in Monaco. The companies themselves pay the tax due in the UK but the family on the other hand on dividends etc do not pay tax as if they were domiciled in the UK as it all goes through his wife who isn't.

The mainstream media is awful and they don't care.

Unless of course you are a politician that can help them out with regulation then they sit on sex stories for a long time.

the current logo / last change is the generic white on black logo, which has become "fashionable" its like graphic designers have forgotten how to graphic design, every new logo, gets more and more basic at the moment.

Not sure how making "British" a bigger part of the logo is going to help, when next to none of what is sold in the store will be British made, it would just come across as fake, and whilst we can discuss if BHS should be aiming to attract the younger generations, the term British is a meaningless phase to many under 30, whose lives are spent looking into a smart phone, watching Game of Thrones.


in fairness there are a few differences here.

1) this is not the last shop in Britain, unlike steel industry jobs, which will never never come back if lost.

2) there is a tendency to romanticise jobs in mining and associated industries, as proper working jobs, for working men, for a variety of reasons.

3) this will not devastate one community, ok I give you there maybe a small town somewhere, where BHS is the big name on their otherwise market town high street, but the steel industry jobs are focused in one location, and have a knock on effect to other British jobs, in the supply chain. As above, there is little British about BHS, so no knock on job looses to worry about.

Of course all of what ive said above is meaningless to the individual BHS staff memeber, who could well be signing on in two weeks time, I seek only to point out why the two examples are not the same.

Yeah, as I said, Green has figured it out, thou he'd be screwed if his wife filed for divorce.

half makes you wish she would just to see his face , though you can bet he has it all tied up in writing over there.