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A MAJOR fashion chain is shutting a popular high street store with hundreds more at risk of closing.
A retail park has confirmed it will be saying goodbye to this site favourite at the end of next month.
New Look in Preston will close on March 20, leaving shoppers having to look elsewhere for the latest fashion.
The brand will close its doors at St George’s Shopping Centre after multiple site closures across the country.
In the store window, the retailer popped up a sign reading: “Preston St George, thanks for having us. But it’s time to say goodbye.
“This store will be closing on Thursday 20th March.”
Customers were then offered a QR code taking them to the New Look website to scour the shop online.
Shoppers were told this was the alternative if you want a “feel-good fashion fix, 24/7.”
At the beggining of the year New Look revealed they would “accelerate future store closures” as each branches lease expires, according to The Times.
This was primarily due to tax spikes looming ahead after Rachel Reeves released the Autumn budget.
There are warnings that a quarter of all the chain stores could be scrapped – which is around 91 branches.
New Look fans in Ireland were gutted to hear that 26 stores would be shutting in the region with far more remaining at risk of vanishing.
Other stores that have got the axe include one in Porth branch in Rhondda Cynon Taf and two in Gateshead.
New Look confirmed the latter with a Facebook post reading: “CLOSING DOWN SALE ALERT!
“It’s time for BIG savings at New Look Team Valley! We’re saying goodbye on March 9th, and everything must go! Tops for just £3! Dresses for only £5! Bottoms for £7! And SO MUCH MORE!
“Hurry in before it’s all gone! Don’t miss out on the biggest bargains of the year! Sale ends March 9th! See you there!”
The St Austell branch in Cornwall is set to shut on March 4, putting up farewell signs reading: “It’s time to say goodbye.”
Other branches that have already disappeared include the Carillon Court Shopping Centre site, the Wickford branch, and the Bracknell store.
The popular fashion brand is implementing a programme before April’s National Insurance increase.
This new plan will put a quarter of New Looks branches are closing for good after their lease expires.
Approximately 91 sites will be impacted which will have a knock-on effect to the staff, plunging 8,000 employees into potential job insecurity.
This isn’t the first time New Look shaken up its portfolio of UK stores, with 600 being scrapped in 2018.
The company has restructured its store estate twice in the past six years, reducing its portfolio from around 600 UK stores in 2018.
The British Retail Consortium has predicted that the Treasury's hike to employer NICs will cost the retail sector £2.3billion.
Research by the British Chambers of Commerce shows that more than half of companies plan to raise prices by early April.
A survey of more than 4,800 firms found that 55% expect prices to increase in the next three months, up from 39% in a similar poll conducted in the latter half of 2024.
Three-quarters of companies cited the cost of employing people as their primary financial pressure.
The Centre for Retail Research (CRR) has also warned that around 17,350 retail sites are expected to shut down this year.
It comes on the back of a tough 2024 when 13,000 shops closed their doors for good, already a 28% increase on the previous year.
Professor Joshua Bamfield, director of the CRR said: “The results for 2024 show that although the outcomes for store closures overall were not as poor as in either 2020 or 2022, they are still disconcerting, with worse set to come in 2025.”
Professor Bamfield has also warned of a bleak outlook for 2025, predicting that as many as 202,000 jobs could be lost in the sector.
“By increasing both the costs of running stores and the costs on each consumer’s household it is highly likely that we will see retail job losses eclipse the height of the pandemic in 2020.”
FOUNDED in 1969 by Tom Singh with a modest loan of £5,000 from his parents, the first shop opened in Taunton, Somerset.
Singh’s vision was simple but revolutionary: to offer the latest fashion trends at accessible prices.
This focus on “fast fashion” proved a winning formula, propelling the brand’s rapid growth throughout the following decades.
By the 1990s, New Look had expanded significantly, growing from 200 to an impressive 1,000 stores.
This period saw the introduction of new lines, including menswear, teen, and maternity wear, further broadening the brand’s appeal.
Embracing the digital age, New Look launched its online store in 2007, bringing its trendy offerings to an even wider audience.
The brand’s success wasn’t confined to the UK. New Look expanded internationally, establishing a presence in numerous countries across Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.
At its peak, the company boasted over 900 stores internationally and employed over 18,000 staff.
New Look’s ownership structure has also evolved over the years. In 2004, the company went private, with founder Tom Singh, chief executive Phil Wrigley, and private equity investors taking the reins.
In 2015, South African investment firm Brait SE acquired a 90% stake in New Look for £780 million, with the Singh family and management retaining the remaining 10%.
Tom Singh himself announced his departure from the company in 2019, marking the end of an era for the brand he buil
THE body of a Brit who went missing in Florida has been found two years after his disappearance while on holiday.
The alarm was raised about Alex Hodgson Doughty, 32, when his worried mum called the cops to say she couldn’t reach him in September 2022.
The Brit had been visiting the Jacksonville area and used a ride-sharing app to get to Kingsland, Georgia.
Alex’s remains were tragically found by cops in Kingsland, around 30 miles north of Jacksonville.
His body was discovered on 4 February in a wooded area on private land, according to the FBI.
Cops and investigators from the FBI Jacksonville Division released a statement following the discovery.
Special Agent in Charge Kristin Rehler said: “While we had hoped to bring Mr. Doughty’s family better news, we are thankful to be able to provide them with some closure.
“This discovery is the direct result of our partnerships and special agents from FBI Jacksonville’s Cellular Analysis Survey Team (CAST), who were relentless in their efforts to narrow down potential search locations.”
The FBI added that it did not suspect any foul play in this case and did not expect to file any criminal charges.
Police did not release further details about Alex or how he died.
Authorities are investigating why the Brit went to Kingsland in the first place.
The FBI used mobile phone based technology to track geolocation data and calls.
This tech was able to help investigators locate Alex’s body.
An official told First Coast News: “This isn’t a traditional investigative technique, such as interviews.
“We used phone based location information and geolocation information derived from electronics we surround ourselves with everyday to retrace their footsteps and to narrow a search area.”
Alex’s initial disappearance has not been the only case of a Brit going missing while on holiday.
Liam Hannigan, 34, vanished on 7 February while in Tenerife, The Sun has previously reported.
The holidaymaker, from Greater Manchester, was staying at a popular Canary Islands resort with his friends, but his family said his phone had been switched off for days.
A British businessman was reported missing in Nairobi, Kenya, after he failed to turn up for a three-day workshop.
A search has since been launched to find Campbell Scott, a senior director with the data analytics company FICO.
LIVERPOOL travel to the Etihad to take on Manchester City in a blockbuster clash TODAY.
The Reds can go an incredible 11 points clear at the top of the table after second-placed Arsenal slipped to a 1-0 defeat to West Ham yesterday.
Liverpool face a wounded City side following their Champions League exit to Real Madrid on Wednesday night.
Erling Haaland was an unused substitute in the Spanish capital and is an injury doubt for this afternoon’s clash with the league leaders.
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FULHAM and Crystal Palace’s Premier League clash came to a complete standstill when two players fought for the ball.
Palace defeated the Cottagers 2-0 on Saturday at Craven Cottage thanks to an own-goal by Joachim Andersen and a goal by Daniel Munoz.
https://twitter.com/Football__Tweet/status/1893658318465577268
Andersen, 28, though, didn’t go viral for accidentally sending the ball behind his own net against his former club.
But for a bizarre standoff he had with former team-mate Eberechi Eze down the left wing.
Eze, 26, gained possession of the ball and was marked by the Fulham ace.
The England international waited for Andersen to come for the ball but his opponent stood there and looked at him.
The Denmark international then pointed at his wrist like it had a watch on to tell the Palace star to get on with it.
The forward tried to bait Andersen with some tricks but the centre-back wouldn’t leave his position.
The standoff continued for about 10 seconds until Eze finally passed the ball away.
Fans were left absolutely baffled and amazed as they stormed social media.
One fan tweeted: “The only way to defend against Eze.”
Another commented: “Defender’s nightmare.”
A third wrote: “Just hope you’re not the one on the receiving end of that skill!”
This fan said: “Scared of getting skinned alive by Eze.”
And that one stated: “This is a funny game indeed.”
WEEKS after their sick bonking battles tore them apart, controversial OnlyFans models Lily Phillips and Bonnie Blue have sparked shocking pregnancy rumours – within hours of one another.
Bonnie, 25, left social media users stunned after uploading a cryptic ”cravings” post on Instagram – and former pal Lily, 24, followed suit just a few hours later.
But while Bonnie has since confirmed she is NOT pregnant, if the two were set to become mothers more or less at the same time, it wouldn’t be the only thing on the long list of strange similarities in their journeys.
Both born and raised in the UK, Lily and Bonnie have launched hugely successful careers racking in a fortune by flogging bizarre X-rated content on OnlyFans.
In addition, the two young women have both hit the headlines following their wild challenges, with Bonnie claiming she bedded more than 1,000 men in just 12 hours.
Previously, the 25-year-old gained international attention after she allegedly had a two-weekend sex marathon in which she slept with over 150 ”barely-legal” college students and filmed it all, while Lily, went viral online after she slept with 101 men in one night, documenting the sick endeavour for a YouTube documentary.
But long before they took the internet by storm, the women also had extremely similar upbringings, as both were raised in small English villages with working-class families.
Between their alike backgrounds and similar aspirations, it came as no surprise that eventually, their paths crossed.
The two young women became close pals after their careers kicked off.
However, their close relationship was soon ripped apart after it was revealed that they were both desperate to break the world record for having sex with the most men in one day.
This record was previously held by Lisa Sparks, who bedded 919 men in a day back in 2004.
Weeks after Lily announced that she had plans to have sex with 1,000 men in 24 hours, rival Bonnie revealed that not only had she broken the record – but that she had allegedly done it in just 12 hours instead of 24.
While it seemed as though Bonnie had rushed to beat Lily to it, the 25-year-old went on a tirade against Lily afterwards, claiming that it was actually her who had thought of it first – and that Lily was the one who had ”stolen” the idea from her.
She told the Daily Mail: “Way before Lily even put it on her socials that she’d like to do the world sex record, and when I helped her out and invited her to do my Freshers content, I shared the idea with her saying that I really wanted to do the world record.
“And I guess I’m very trustworthy and oblivious to people’s bitterness so I shared my idea that I’d like to do it.”
She shared how three months later, Lily announced on social media that she was doing the world record.
Bonnie added: “Rivalry suggests competition and that I don’t have. In terms of the world record, both me and Lily know it was my idea as l’d spoken to her about it.”
Fast-forward to weeks later and Bonnie set the web ablaze with speculation that she was expecting a child on Wednesday, February 19th.
Hours after the news erupted online, her former friend Lily uploaded a photo cradling a ”baby bump”.
From their eerily alike childhood to identical headline-making antics and race to sleep with 1,000 men, here are Bonnie’s and Lily’s similar stories.
Bonnie, born Tia Emma Billinger, grew up in a small village in Nottingham, England.
She shared with News.com.au last year that she had a ”simple” middle-class upbringing and had dreams of being a midwife or a detective when she grew up.
”I had a very average life, really,” she said.
”I didn’t go to a private school and my parents had money but nothing crazy.
”We would go on one holiday a year, and if we needed work on the kitchen or something, we’d have to save up or cut back on a holiday that year.”
As a teenager, Bonnie was passionate about dancing and had a part time job at her local Poundstretcher – but she often bemoaned her lack of money online.
”Bank card just got declined. Too poor for the life I want to live,” she wrote in a post from 2016, hinting at the kind of future she wanted.
”She was really popular and wore loads of make-up,” a former classmate previously told DailyMail.com.
”She was friends with the girls and boys in the years above as well.”
At age 15, she began dating Oliver Davidson, a talented swimmer and rugby player, who studied at Trent College in Nottingham where school fees can reach £45,000 a year.
Despite finding work in recruitment, marrying Ollie and settling into a £250k semi-detached house (bought with the support from Oliver’s parents), Bonnie yearned for more and eventually moved to Australia.
”I always wanted to live in the sun and have a better work-life balance because, in the UK, I felt like I was wasting my life,” she shared with the outlet. ‘
”I wanted more from my life.”
Soon after the move, ditched her 9 to 5 to become a cam girl, claiming it was Oliver who gave her the confidence to enter the adult entertainment industry.
Lily’s background is extremely similar to Bonnie’s, as she also grew up with in a working-class family in a remote English village.
But unlike Bonnie, who moaned online about wanting to have a lavish life as a teen, Lily’s family came into money when she was aged 10, after her father established his own cleaning company.
Following the success of her dad’s business, the youngster enjoyed luxurious perks, such as jetting off on two holidays a year and her family owning several luxury cars as well as a spacious four-bedroom pad.
”My parents loved to spoil us,” she previously shared.
”I had a very comfortable, happy life. It was the picture-perfect childhood and I had amazing parents.”
Lily was also described as a popular girl by former classmates, with one telling DailyMail.com: ”Lily had a lovely, comfortable life and was a great girl and some of us were very envious of her.
”She was good fun, had lots of friends and didn’t have any money worries because her parents were rich.”
But despite her ”picture perfect” childhood, she told DailyMail.com that she developed something of a fascination with sex as a young teenager and first watched porn at the unripe age of 13.
”I don’t know why but I’ve been obsessed with sex from a young age. I was always more into sex than my friends and was always talking about it at school,” she said.
Lily joined OnlyFans in 2020 and made a whopping £10k in her first month alone, while she was studying nutrition at Sheffield University.
After joining the camming business, Bonnie quickly became ”obsessed” with it and began to make thousands every week.
As the job became more demanding, she decided to switch to OnlyFans at 24 – and it wasn’t long until she separated from husband Oliver.
Single Bonnie then focused her attention on men as young as 18, as she had realised there was a space in the market ”for someone being with a schoolboy”.
”From a business point of view, I knew there was a massive gap that I could exploit,” she previously told DailyMail.com.
”And sleeping with 18-year-olds makes the content a lot more relatable to the subscribers who are younger.”
Earlier last year, in September 2024, the OnlyFans model came under fire after posting a photo where she was urging students of her hometown to sleep with her – and let her share the footage on the subscription platform.
The decision to bed ”barely legal teens” lead to huge scrutiny of the controversial model – but it also gained her massive attention.
Meanwhile, Lily previously explained that she joined the site in 2020 after ”sleeping around” during college.
”I was sort of selling sex to guys on my nights out without making any money, so I thought I might as well charge for it,” shared the star.
”I was at university and already being such a “sluzza” so I thought ‘Why don’t I try OnlyFans and make a bit of money on the side?”’
The 24-year-old found international fame, after she had sex with 101 men in one night and chronicled the bizarre antics for a documentary.
The 47-minute video shed light on some of the downsides to such extreme sexual challenges for content, and in one scene, Lily was seen sobbing as she told the host: ”Sometimes you just disassociate… it’s not like normal sex at all.”
”In my head I can think of five, six guys, 10 guys that I remember. And that’s it.”
Soon after both of them had become on of the top creators on the platform, the two women became friends.
Bonnie told DailyMail.com in January that they grew close last year, and insisted that she even helped Lily grow her career by introducing her to media contacts.
”I helped Lily with publicity. I don’t feel like people in the industry need to be jealous, there’s multiple subscribers and plenty of space for everyone,” Bonnie said.
But the bond was quickly shattered after Bonnie suggested that Lily had ”stolen” her idea to beat the world record and bonk 1,000 in one day.
According to Daily Mail, Lily was the first to speak about the sick challenge, telling the publication about her bizarre goal in December 2024.
However, Bonnie beat her to it and in January this year, she shocked everyone after announcing she’d allegedly slept with 1,057 men in just 12 hours.
She insisted that her focus while having sex for 12 hours was not on numbers and the ”world record” but on providing pleasure for her loyal fans.
”Way before Lily even put it on her socials that she’d like to do the world sex record … I shared the idea with her saying that I really wanted to do the world record,” Bonnie told DailyMail.com.
”Then it wasn’t until three months later, she then announced on her socials that she was doing the world record.
”Rivalry suggests competition and that I don’t have. In terms of the world record, both me and Lily know it was my idea as l’d spoken to her about it.”
Earlier this week, on Wednesday, February 19th, Bonnie set social media ablaze after uploading a cryptic post of her ”cravings”.
She posted a snap of pickles covered in chocolate sauce and sprinkles as well as dry noodles and chicken nuggets, which she captioned with, ”#Cravings”.
Right away, social media erupted with theories that Bonnie was expecting – rumours which she has since cleared.
Hours later, ex-pal Lily claimed that she too was going to have a baby in a shocking social media post.
The rival uploaded a snap that showed her cradling her ”bump”, writing: ”The secret is out. Baby Phillips 2025.”
The notorious model also included a snap of two pregnancy tests, one of which appeared to be positive while the second one – with a very faint second line – seemed to be inconclusive.
Although it has not yet been confirmed whether Lily is indeed expecting a child, the announcement was met with scepticism by many.
One person urged: ”Don’t fall for this stunt. Remember they just out for you attention.”
”This is not real,” another wrote.
”She wearing a fake baby bump,” someone else chimed in.
Some suggested the snap of Lily’s bump was generated by AI while others questioned her appearance in previous posts, with one eagle-eyed web user noting: ”You were ultra skinny in the gym like 12 hours ago!
”How’ve you kept this a secret?!”
Many also questioned who the father could be, especially after Lily claimed to have bedded 101 men in a sick challenge last year.
A TEENAGE boy has been rushed to hospital after being stabbed in the chest in a Primark.
The 17–year-old was attacked in “full view” of shoppers at the store in Nottingham city centre this morning.
Cops believe there was an altercation outside the Long Row shop between a group of youths prior to the incident at around 11.30am on Sunday.
A suspect then fled towards Old Market Square.
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