2024 retail woes: 170,000 jobs lost, worse predicted ahead

The UK retail sector has faced yet another challenging year, with nearly 170,000 shop workers losing their jobs in 2024, according to data published this week by the Centre for Retail Research (CRR). The organisation reported that 13,479 stores shuttered operations between January and December, culminating in 169,395 job losses.

The outlook for 2025 appears even bleaker. The CRR forecasts 17,349 store closures, alongside a staggering 201,953 retail job losses. These figures underscore the continuing struggles of a sector long beleaguered by shifting consumer habits, rising costs, and structural changes in the economy.

A crisis decades in the making

Retailing in much of the Western world has been in turmoil for over a decade, with the CRR tracing the origins of the crisis to the debt-fuelled expansion of brick-and-mortar stores in the 2000s. This period of aggressive growth pushed city-centre rents to unsustainable levels. The 2008 financial crisis abruptly halted this trajectory, triggering a wave of bankruptcies and store closures. Among the most notable casualties was Woolworths, whose demise epitomised the fragility of the traditional retail model.

The online retail revolution

Compounding these challenges is the meteoric rise of online retail. The UK has experienced one of the fastest transitions to e-commerce globally, with online sales accounting for 6.6 percent of retail activity in 2006 and surging to 19.2 percent by 2019. The pandemic accelerated this trend as lockdowns and health concerns drove consumers to shop online, with online sales surpassing 36 percent of total retail turnover during the first quarter of 2021.

While the share of online sales has since stabilised, it remains significantly higher than pre-pandemic levels, reaching 27.1 percent in 2024—30 percent above 2019 figures. This structural shift has eroded revenues for physical stores, rendering many previously viable outlets unsustainable.

A worsening trajectory

The CRR’s latest figures build on its 2023 findings, which documented 10,494 store closures and 119,405 job losses. The data paints a stark picture of a sector in long-term decline, grappling with rising operational costs, changing consumer preferences, and the relentless growth of e-commerce.

As the industry looks ahead to 2025, the forecast of record job losses and store closures serves as a sobering reminder of the challenges that lie ahead. Addressing these systemic issues will require innovation, adaptation, and potentially a reimagining of what physical retail can offer in a digitally-dominated landscape.