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05
Sept
Harrogate shop survives the cull as Bodycare falls into administration
Bodycare, the nationwide health and beauty retailer, fell into administration today, but its Harrogate branch is safe – for the time being.
The company confirmed this afternoon that it will shut 32 shops of its 148 shops and make around 450 of its 1,500 employees redundant.
It published a list of the stores scheduled for closure, but the Cambridge Street branch was not among them.
The troubled company had been working for several months with advisory firm Interpath to find a rescue deal.
But no buyer has been found and now Interpath will take over operations at the company until a long-term solution can be found.
Interpath has said it will continue running the business from the surviving shops, which "will remain open and operational as usual".
Bodycare has faced a number of headwinds in recent years, including rising costs, including rent and staff costs, a delayed transition to its online retail platform, and the cost-of-living crisis.
In addition, a planned IPO in 2024 was aborted which led to a shortfall in funding. This then placed strain on supplier relationships, resulting in a shortage of stock.
Nick Holloway, joint administrator and managing director at Interpath, said:
These remain challenging times for high-street retailers as rising costs and reduced consumer spending continue to weigh heavily on trading.
Unfortunately for Bodycare, which was also contending with a significant funding gap and increasing creditor pressure, these challenges proved too difficult to overcome.
Bodycare's website, including its online shop, is currently not working.
The dominoes started to topple this week. First the firm’s website and online shop went offline, then stores in Clydebank, Wrexham, Rhyl, Morecambe and Beverley closed one after the other, and there were fears that all the rest would have to close too.
As we reported earlier in the week, the branch in Harrogate town centre has looked understocked for some time, and no deliveries have been made for at least three weeks.
Since the shop has survived the cull, deliveries will presumably resume soon, but it is not yet known when. The company’s website remains down.
Bodycare was founded by Graham and Margaret Blackledge in Skelmersdale in 1970, but is now owned by Baaj Capital, a family office run by Bradford entrepreneur Jas Singh. Its other investments have included party products supplier Amscan International, which it bought out of administration in July 2024, and women’s clothing retailer In The Style, which went into administration and was sold in March.
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