UK retailer M&S to invest £13 million in North East store estate (2024)

UK retailer M&S has announced a £13 million investment in its North East store estate for the year ahead, with confirmation that the interior of the retailer’s Northumberland Street store will be transformed in a top-to-bottom, multi-million pound redesign, offering Newcastle city centre shoppers the very best of M&S with a fresh-market style Foodhall and a new, refreshed clothing, home & beauty department.

Works at the M&S Newcastle store, which has been a fixture of the city’s high street since it first opened its doors in 1932, will begin this month. The redesign will be carried out in stages so the store can stay open, serving customers as normal throughout, with the new Foodhall expected to be fully completed later this year. Improvements to the clothing, home & beauty department will follow and be completed by early 2024.

The news follows the announcement that the retailer is set to open a brand-new, bigger M&S store at the Galleries Retail Park in Washington. The new store will offer local customers a bigger range of M&S products than ever before, with the retailer relocating from its existing Simply Food store into a 47,000 sq ft space with a new clothing, home & beauty department and a bigger M&S Foodhall – nearly double the size of the current offering.

Construction work is already underway to bring together three previously separate units on the Galleries Retail Park to create the new space. Ahead of the relocation, the existing M&S Simply Food store in Washington will stay open as normal until the new story is ready – expected to be in spring 2024. There will be opportunities for all colleagues working in the current store to transfer to the new M&S Washington Galleries or other local M&S stores and the retailer has confirmed the new store will also create additional new jobs for the local community when it opens next year.

The £13 million announcement follows investment in the North East by M&S last year to update its store in Newcastle’s Silverlink Shopping Park and the M&S Foodhall in Gosforth, the company said in a press release.

M&S has 21 owned stores across the North East – spanning the region from Berwick-upon-Tweed to Teesside, supporting over 2,100 jobs in local communities, as well as an additional 6 M&S stores in hospitals and travel settings including rail and fuel stations. This latest round of investment will enable the retailer to reach even more customers in the North East, delivering the very best of M&S with the latest store design and new in-store technology to offer a seamless omni-channel experience for customers, including mobile “Scan & Shop” – currently used by 33,000 customers each week – which lets shoppers use their phones to scan and bag items as they shop and digital screens to help make it quicker and easier to Click & Collect orders, with parcels ready in under 60 seconds.

“M&S has been a part of local communities across the North East for well over a hundred years, and throughout that time we’ve always been innovating to keep delivering an excellent shopping experience for our customers – whether it’s the opening of one of our first ever Penny Bazaars in Newcastle’s famous Grainger Market in 1895, or launching our first ever shopping centre site in the country at the Metro Centre in 1986. We’re proud to have been trading from our store on Northumberland Street since 1932. Over the years we’ve undertaken plenty of refurbishments and extensions to make sure the store keeps delivering for local customers and today’s investment – as well as our plans for an exciting new store at Washington Galleries – shows that we’re as committed as ever to offering shoppers in the North East the very best of M&S,”Helen Cowie, regional manager for the North East at M&S, said.

The renewal of M&S Newcastle and the new store in Washington Galleries are key parts of the retailer’s £480 million investment in bigger, better stores across the UK, generating over 3,400 new jobs and creating a fit for the future M&S store estate which provides a seamless experience for customers every time they shop.