The demise of BHS has left a hole in the British high street, but it’s also left an opportunity for other retailers to hoover up its market share.

At the last count, BHS recorded annual sales of £668m. In this tough market, where growth is hard to come by, it is a number not to be sniffed at.

But where are BHS’s former customers shopping now?

Clothing

Despite the bulk of BHS’s sales coming from clothing, the retailer’s market share had been dwindling. In 2015 it held just a 1% share of the overall market, compared to 1.5% in 2011.

BHS clothing market share

BHS clothing market share

BHS clothing market share

Retail Week Prospect senior analyst Rebecca Marks says M&S and Next would be the main beneficiaries of the BHS clothing shoppers’ spend.

“Its consumer base enjoys the department store convenience of having a variety of products to browse in one place,” she says.

Global Data lead retail analyst Honor Strachan agrees and adds Debenhams, Primark and Asda to the list of benefactors.

YouGov Profiles data showed that people who shopped at BHS were more likely to be customers of Marks & Spencer, Debenhams and Primark.

Almost half (49%) of BHS customers surveyed last year also shopped at M&S, while just over a quarter (27%) use Debenhams and Primark.

Marks & Spencer

Marks & Spencer

Marks says that Tesco’s F&F and Sainsbury’s Tu clothing brands would also have experienced an uplift due to the “similarity of its clothing offer” to BHS, especially when it comes to children’s clothing.

However, she points out that winning a slice of BHS’s limited clothing share would have little impact on major retailers’ top line.

She says: “Its clothing proposition became irrelevant over the last five years of its trading, meaning many of its customers had already moved on to its competitors by the time it went into administration.

“So, any additional sales, and share, that the likes of Next, M&S and Debenhams would have picked-up from 2016 wouldn’t have been as drastically noticeable as it had already started to happen over the five years prior to its demise.”

But Marks points out that it is difficult to determine how much each retailer will have gained from BHS’s approximate £400m of clothing sales, since it hasn’t shown through in any retailers’ sales.

“GM continues to be down at M&S and Next is struggling with clothing sales besides its directory side, while Debenhams’ focus is on reducing clothing sales,” she says.

“Given the difficult market in 2016/17 and the general fall in fashion sales throughout the year, it’s likely its typical 45+ consumer hasn’t invested too heavily in clothing offers elsewhere yet.”

Homewares

Homewares accounted for around 30% of BHS sales (around £200m).

Marks says the story here is similar to that in clothing, with the likes of Next, Debenhams and M&S most likely to have benefitted from the department store chain’s collapse by attracting a similar customer base.

BHS homewares market share

BHS homewares market share

BHS homewares market share

In lighting – perhaps BHS’s biggest area of strength – Debenhams has made an active push. The department store hired BHS’s lighting buying team after the retailer went bust and has launched lighting departments in 30 shops.

Debenhams trading director Suzanne Harlow said yesterday that she was “really pleased” with its lighting offer.

“When you consider that team did it in three months, it has come together very well. It was a category we were weak in so it’s been great to get into it,” she said.

Strachan believes other retailers likely to have grabbed homewares share include Amazon, Argos, Dunelm, Ikea and Sainsbury’s.

Debenhams new lighting offer

Debenhams new lighting offer

Debenhams new lighting offer

But Marks points out that B&M has experienced phenomenal growth over the past year, and suggests that could have been aided by BHS’s disappearance.

“Even though BHS wasn’t considered a value player, its image came across this way, and its customers are likely to have also shopped at homeware discounters,” she says. 

Marks admits B&M had similarly spectacular growth in 2015/16, however she speculates that BHS shoppers may have fueled its continued stellar performance.