After a “turbulent” trading year, it certainly wasn’t all bad news for Coats Group despite delivering mostly negative numbers in its 12-month trading statement to 31 December on Thursday.

​UK footfall climbed steadily during February and while the year-on-year decline compared to a year ago remained huge (-61%), it was better than the -65.6% seen in January.

Heralded as becoming “Scotland’s premier designer village” the Caledonia Park redevelopment in Gretna has completed a “significant” first phase, according to the project’s investor RPMI Railpen.

Chancellor Rishi Sunak has unveiled what has been touted as the most important budget statement in decades. And there's plenty in the latest announcement that directly impacts the fashion and retail sectors.

Data and analytics expert Manjiry Tamhane has joined property giant Landsec as an independent non-executive director. 

Ahead of Wednesday’s key budget, the government has received calls to cut retail taxes and provide extra support for women in business.

UK shoppers are continuing to flood back to stores, even though most remain closed at present, and this bodes well for non-essential stores reopening next month.

Debenhams is closing its 15 Scottish stores immediately with 647 job losses as a result, its administrator said in an update on the process to wind down the remaining parts of the business that Boohoo didn't buy.

​John Lewis Partnership has been quietly opening John Lewis department store concessions in its Waitrose supermarkets. And while only a few have opened so far, it's reportedly planning to speed up this process.

​Selfridges had already flagged the fact that its sales rose and its net profits fell in the year to February 2020, but it has now officially filed its annual results and the full extent of that performance can be seen.

The 27-year-old Chinese-Australian fashion influencer has been appointed as editor-in-chief of Vogue China, becoming the youngest person to hold the position at any of the magazine’s international editions.

Citing “changing consumer behaviours” due to the coronavirus pandemic, Boots on Friday announced major job cuts at its head office operations.

It wasn’t all about lost jobs and failing businesses last year. A new study reveals 835,494 new businesses were registered in the 12 months to January 2021, with the online retail sector the main beneficiary. 

E-tail took another socially positive step forward Thursday to improve its somewhat tarnished image with eBay announcing it’s planning to invest millions of pounds in creating jobs and opportunities in the UK.

Shopper can expect an “animated, interesting and welcoming” return when retail restrictions are lifted next month. That’s the upbeat promise from London retail property giant Shaftesbury Thursday. 

Online retail group N Brown said Thursday that its chairman Matt Davies is stepping down from his post at the end of next month in order to “spend more time on his other business activities”.