At an average of four retailers in the united kingdom are getting bust every day due to the excessive amount of competition they are facing from the online websites and the increasing costs, which are creating a sort of chaos on the streets of Great Britain. In a study that was reported recently, it was suggested that this crisis is surrounding the various industries and hence it was reported that there were around three hundred and fifty shops and retail houses that went bankrupt between the initial three months of the year that is, between the months of January and March. This is around as high as twenty-five percent more than the same time of the year and almost forty percent more than the three terminal months of the year 2018.
Increasing threats to the shops
As mentioned in the report by various experts the high street of the country is going to lose more shops as retailers are being haunted and beaten by the various online outlets and the high as well as constantly increasing business rates and rents of the shops. It wouldn’t be wrong to say that these retailers are on a constant battle with the online counterparts and are on the edge of a cliff just hanging fighting big online retailers like Amazon and Asos.
What are the results?
The result of this battle between the online and offline retailers are making many conventional retailers cut down prices to a minimum in an attempt to increase the sales and still hitting the profit during the process, as mentioned by a report by the British Retail Consortium or BRC. The chief executive officer of Tesco is urging the various ministers of the parliament to decrease the business rates as well as imposing taxes on the online shops by a rate of 2 percent. This would surely be a desperate attempt to decrease the pressure on the shopkeepers and letting them remain in the competition. This crisis has called for many campaigns that were held by offline shopkeepers for asking for a fair play with their online counterparts. This brought the downfall of various big names of the game like the HMV, Debenhams and LK Bennett.
Moreover, it is seen that around two million people are going to lose their job because of this effect as there are many companies as Topshop and Marks & Spencer are closing their stores. There was a net worth of around 700 million euros that was collected as a business rate bill from Britain’s biggest retailer Tesco. It is said the system that collects and determines the business rates are really outdated and hence one should be changing it or update it according to the present business scenarios.
The constant battle between the online and offline retailers are increasing day by day and hence there are people who are facing constant pressure. This is where the business model needs to get updated and provide a fair ground for both the methods of business.
