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3 years ago
Although Next is the largest clothing retailer by sales in the United Kingdom, I still prefer Marks & Spencer. M&S had this title up to around 2014. Next has way over 30,000 employees so it's a significant operation. The amount of floor space in this store is over two floors and impressive; and they also have a coffee bar on the first floor. Here again I prefer M&S coffee so it's just as well there's an M&S a few yards away. Yes it's yards as we left Europe so it's back to imperial. Feet, inches and all that jazz. In March 2023, it was announced Next had acquired vintage fashion and homeware retailer Cath Kidston out of administration for £8.5 million. The acquisition meant Next had bought the brand name, domain names and intellectual property, but remaining stock was to be sold off by administrators and the four Cath Kidston stores (London, York, Ashford, Cheshire Oaks) were to shut. My problem with this mega wealthy chain store is a deserved reputation of failing to pay workers a living wage when George Bain, who set the first UK minimum wage in 1999, confirmed they really could afford to. I knew George back then. I could listen to him speak all day long. UK taxpayers pay over £30 billion a year to low-paid workers through tax credits, and retail companies - which have the highest proportion of low paid workers - are still exploiting austerity and effectively adding staff wages to the UK welfare bill. M&S refuse to consider real living wages for workers. When asked to explain the exploitative salaries of lower-wage workers despite stonking large profits, a presumably well paid Next spokesperson replied that the company had thirty applicants for every job advertised - which is side stepping an honest answer of simply being greedy bastards - would they pay even less if they had say sixty applicants for every job? read more
