Mountain Warehouse to open 50 more stores

Mountain Warehouse has pledged to open another 50 stores next year while brushing off fears about the death of the British high street.

The outdoor clothing chain has committed to an aggressive expansion of physical stores, both in Britain and overseas, amid a boom in demand for in-person shopping.

It will open about 50 stores globally this year, taking its total to about 370 in nine countries.

“We think there is lots of life left in lots of our high streets,” Mark Neale, 56, the company’s founder and chief executive, said. “All that death of the high street stuff has been a bit overdone. We’re definitely very positive about physical retail at the moment.”

After a decade of decline, bricks-and-mortar shopping has been enjoying a renaissance. Retailers are being tempted back by cheaper rents, investors are taking advantage of cut-price deals and consumers are rediscovering their desire for in-store shopping.

Several British retail chains have been in expansion mode, including Sainsbury’s, B&M, Waitrose and Marks & Spencer. Hotel Chocolat, White Stuff and Dunelm are also planning to open new stores.

Larger stores have become a target for Mountain Warehouse after it developed a much larger product range during the pandemic, when it was forced to shift to online sales only and was no longer constrained by the size of its shops.

Neale, who founded Mountain Warehouse in 1997 from a store in Swindon, Wiltshire, said: “We’ve been opening lots of much bigger stores and relocating some smaller, more legacy stores.”

Unlike most clothing retailers, Mountain Warehouse benefited from a wetter British summer. “The changeable weather is always quite good for us,” Neale said. “Sales of waterproof jackets have been reasonably robust, but we’ve also got a good range of stuff for people going on holiday: shorts, T-shirts, wetsuits and changing robes.”

The retailer reported record revenue of £386 million for the year to February 25, up 4 per cent year-on-year and the highest in its 27-year history. The group made pre-tax profits of £26.2 million.

Its online business, which includes the Mountain Warehouse Marketplace with more than 320 third-party brands selling products such as paddleboards and ebikes, accounts for almost a third of revenue, up from just under a quarter before the pandemic.

Mountain Warehouse struck a £7.6 million deal last week to acquire the US-based Eastern Mountain Sports as part of its global expansion plans.

Eastern Mountain Sports filed for Chapter 11 protection in June for the third time because of what its owners described as a “liquidity crisis”. The company was bought by GoDigital Media from Frasers Group in 2022.

“The US is by far the biggest outdoor market in the world,” Neale said. “We’re building a global business, so we can’t ignore the US.”