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Carphone Warehouse to close all 11 Best Buy shops

Carphone Warehouse is to close all of its 11 Best Buy stores across the UK, the company has announced.

The move puts 1,100 jobs at risk at the outlets, which sell electronic goods, but the firm said it hoped to find the "large majority" alternative work.

The 11 Best Buy stores are part of Best Buy Europe, a joint venture between US group Best Buy and Carphone Warehouse.

The first Best Buy store in the UK only opened in April of last year. The outlets have failed to make a profit.

'Economic times'

Best Buy's 11 UK outlets are in Liverpool, Derby, Bristol, Nottingham, Rotherham, Dudley, Thurrock, Southampton, and three places in London - Croydon, Hayes and Enfield.

Carphone Warehouse and Best Buy initially planned to open 200 Best Buy stores across the UK and continental Europe.

Best Buy Europe was formed in 2008 when Best Buy paid £1.1bn to buy a 50% stake in Carphone Warehouse's retail division.

Carphone Warehouse said the focus would now be on selling more electronics goods from Best Buy Europe's 805 Carphone Warehouse stores in the UK, and 1,648 Phone House shops in continental Europe.

Best Buy Europe said in a statement: "Since 2008, the consumer electronics marketplace has changed substantially as a result of the economic times, the progress of online retailing and the growth of new products such as smartphones, tablets and apps."

Asos boss unfazed by slowing UK sales growth as international revenues soar

His comments came as the online fashion retailer's interim results revealed a 36pc fall in pre-tax profits, due to one-off costs of moving to a new warehouse in Barnsley.

Asos shares took a dive last month when the company revealed a significant slow-down in UK sales growth, at just 1pc in the second quarter. This brought domestic growth for the first half down to 8pc, compared with 26pc for the first half last year.

The company nevertheless saw total retail sales growth for the first half of 60pc, at £211m, on the back of impressive international sales growth of 150pc.

Mr Robertson said the UK remained "challenging" and he expected domestic sales growth would remain "somewhere between flat and low single digit" over coming months as rival retailers continued to offer heavy discounts.

He said he would still "pull some levers" to keep Asos's UK business going, but he did not have to "go with the flow and promote and discount in the way that everybody else is" when he could instead sell the same item to someone abroad for greater profit.

"I have one warehouse and one dress," he said. "That dress is sat in Barnsley. If I sell that dress in Aberdeen or Adelaide it makes no difference to me. The difference is that if I sell it in Adelaide I make more money."

Despite higher transportation costs, sales in Australia were 30-40pc more profitable, due to exchange rates, the fact he did not have to pay VAT on those sales, and Australian consumers being "less promotionally driven".

Asos reported a retail gross margin for the first half of 49.1pc. Mr Robertson said: "Our retail margin has gone up and our retail margin in H2 is going to go up even more."

Sales outside the UK already account for 58pc of total and Mr Robertson expects this figure to be more than 90pc by 2015/16.

Asos has websites in the United States, France, Germany, Australia, Spain and Italy and is planning expansion into China within the next two years once it develops its website platform to handle different language characters.

Despite slowing domestic growth, Mr Robertson was adamant that Asos had "categorically not" hit saturation point in the UK market, with two million registered customers compared with six million 16-34-year-olds shopping online, and brand awareness lower than it could be.

He said: "I spent less in marketing in the UK in H2 than I did last year. I could turn a lever and drive it and make it happen but I would rather turn a lever internationally because that's considerably more profitable for me."

Pre-tax profits in the six months to September 30 were £4.49m but, excluding the £7.2m exceptional costs of the warehouse move, were up 66pc at £11.7m. Total group revenues were £217.3m, up 56pc.

Shares in Asos fell 62p or 4.1pc in early trading but by lunchtime had recovered slightly and were down 17p, or 1.13pc, at £14.83. Asos shares peaked at £25 in June.

U.K. Retail Sales Fall as Consumer Squeeze Dents Confidence

U.K. retail sales fell in October for a fifth month as hardware and footwear purchases faltered, the Confederation of British Industry said.

The gauge of annual sales growth was at minus 11 compared with minus 15 in September, which was the lowest since May 2010, the London-based business lobby said in a report today. A gauge of expected sales for next month showed an increase to 4, which the CBI said points to modest growth.

U.K. households are under pressure from the biggest public spending squeeze since World War II and inflation that's accelerated to 5.2 percent, the highest in three years. The Bank of England expanded stimulus this month and Markets Director Paul Fisher said the decision was justified by the risk the economy may already be shrinking.

“Family budgets continue to be stretched because of a combination of high inflation, low wage growth and soaring unemployment, so consumer confidence is severely dented,” Ian McCafferty, chief economic adviser at the CBI, said in a statement. “Consumers will continue to be on the back foot.”

A measure of three-month sales volumes fell to minus 13 this month, the lowest since August 2009, from minus 11, the CBI said. An index of the volume of sales for the time of year fell to minus 34, the weakest since May 2009, from minus 30.

A gauge of orders placed on suppliers rose to 1 from minus 16, while an index of stock volumes in relation to expected demand fell 1 point to 15.

Asos Plc, the U.K.'s second-largest online clothing retailer, said Oct. 14 that U.K. sales growth in the fiscal second quarter slowed as weakening consumer sentiment restrained shoppers. Kingfisher Plc Chief Executive Officer Ian Cheshire said this month that the market is “more uncertain than it's ever been.” A Nationwide Building Society index of consumer confidence fell 3 points in September to 45.

The Bank of England raised its bond-purchase program by 75 billion pounds ($120 billion) to 275 billion pounds this month and kept the key interest rate at a record-low 0.5 percent.

“There was sufficient downward momentum in the U.K. economy to justify 75 billion,” Fisher said in an interview published today.

Retail sales bounce in September but summer slowdown alarms experts

UK retail sales unexpectedly picked up last month as laptops were snapped up for the start of term and new releases lifted video game sales, but economists warned that the underlying picture remained bleak.

The Office for National Statistics said sales volumes rose 0.6% on the month, above economists' forecasts for no growth and more than reversing a 0.4% fall in August. Sales volumes were up 0.6% on a year earlier, just below economists' forecasts for a 0.7% rise.

But sales fell -0.2% for the three months of July-September, using the less volatile three-month on three-month measure. Economists said that echoed downbeat reports from the high street, including a 94% crash in profits at Argos.

"A quick look at the data for previous months is enough to erode any hopes of a recovery on the high street. Spending over the summer months was revised down, meaning we are seeing an even weaker trend in spending than previously thought," said Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit.

"With unemployment at 8.1% and set to rise further, the cost of living increasing at the fastest rate for 20 years and household confidence bruised by worries about the economic outlook at home and abroad, retail sales will inevitably be under pressure in coming months. Retailers are facing a challenging lead up to Christmas and the festive season may be one of the toughest yet that we've seen in recent memory."

The ONS said the sales at its "other stores" category were up 2.3% on the month, the biggest rise since October 2010, largely down to laptop sales and some big video game launches.

The warm weather, as expected, appeared to hurt clothes sales. The ONS said textile, clothing and footwear sales volumes fell more in September 2011 than in any other retail sector, down by 2.1% on a year earlier, the largest fall for more than three years.

Online retail sales to grow 11% a year across EU for next five years

Online retail within the largest European Union nations in Western Europe will grow at an 11% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) over the next five years, reaching a total value of €114 billion by 2014, according to a new forecast from Forrester Research.

The US will also see double-digit growth over the same period, says Forrester, although at a slightly lower rate of 10% a year, to reach just under $249 billion by 2014.

“Much of the overall retail sector’s growth in both the US and the EU over the next five years will come from the internet,” says Forrester Research’s Sucharita Mulpuru. “To maximize that growth, ebusiness professionals will have to help enable a multichannel strategy that responds to consumers’ increased desire to hop between the offline and online worlds and their increasing mobile and social behaviors. The retail innovators over the next five years will demonstrate customer enablement across all touchpoints, not just via a PC-based web browser.”

Despite consumers’ increasing use of the Web to research products before purchasing, most retailers still fall short on offering a seamless cross-channel experience, say the analysts. According to Forrester’s data, while 82% of US online consumers are satisfied with buying experiences that began and ended in a store, satisfaction drops to 61% for consumers who began their research online and purchased in a store.

Forrester’s European Union forecast encompasses 17 Western European nations and includes a country-by-country breakdown of online retail across the seven largest markets: France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and the UK.

Highlights of Forrester’s ‘Western European Online Retail Forecast, 2009-2014′ include:

• Increased online tenure, improved access, and greater promotion by retailers will drive the number of online shoppers in Europe from 141 million in 2009 to 190 million by 2014. The average spend per online shopper will rise from €483 in 2009 to €601 in 2014.
• Books, event tickets, and clothing are the top three categories purchased online in the majority of Western Europe.
• Among the three largest EU markets, online retail will grow at a 10% CAGR over the next five years in the UK; 9% in Germany; and 13% in France.

“There is a clear divide between the countries of northern and southern Europe regarding online retail adoption,” explains Forrester’s Patti Freeman Evans. “While nearly half of UK residents regularly make a purchase online, a mere 10% of online Spaniards and 11% of online Italians do so today. Still, with compound annual growth rates approaching 20% in markets like Spain, emerging European ecommerce markets are poised for a vigorous period of growth.”