Up-to-date coverage of the latest events in UK retail.

Nike launches subscription service

Footwear giant Nike has unveiled a subscription service for children’s sneakers.

The brand and retailer’s Nike Adventure Club service supplies members with options ranging from four to 12 pairs of sneakers per year. Old pairs can be returned to Nike for donation or recycling.

Nike Adventure Club director of product experience and retention Dominique Shortell said: “In providing footwear, we’re always trying to answer, ‘what do kids want?’

“But an equally important question is, ‘what kind of experience are we providing for their parents?’ We want to make shopping for footwear as convenient as possible for them.”

Amazon applies for liquor store licence

Etailer Amazon has applied for a license to open a liquor store in San Francisco.

The 200 sq ft storefront at an Amazon San Francisco warehouse would enable customers to purchase alcohol directly and give the retailer a base from which to deliver alcohol to Prime Now customers in the city, Business Insider reported.

The store would be open from 8am to 4pm daily, but deliveries could be made until midnight.

Amazon already delivers alcohol to Prime Now members in cities including Chicago, New York and Washington DC.

Poundland pilots move from single price to ‘simple’ price

Variety store group Poundland to pilot prices below £1 for the first time, along with a variety of higher price points to deliver “even more amazing value” for shoppers

Poundland said the new price architecture would allow it to “extend ranges to cover a larger proportion of the volume items demanded by customers”.

The pilot is being run in 24 branches in the Midlands.

Card Factory posts sales rise despite tough trading conditions

Greetings card specialist Card Factory has reported a rise in first-half sales and expects to meet full-year profit expectations.

Card Factory said that group sales rose 5.5% in the six months to July 31, when like-for-like sales advanced 1.5%. The retailer described performance as “robust in a challenging consumer environment”.

Next boss Wolfson: No-deal Brexit will only bring ‘mild disruption’

Next chief executive Lord Wolfson believes that chaos can be avoided in the event of a no-deal Brexit, which would only bring “mild disruption”.

The new Government is preparing for a departure from the EU better than its predecessor, he told the BBC’s Today Programme.

Wolfson, a supporter of Brexit, said however that he still hopes a deal will be possible.

Top retailers call on chancellor to fix broken business rates system

More than 50 retailers have written to new chancellor Sajid Javid demanding action to lighten the burden of business rates.

In a letter coordinated by the British Retail Consortium, industry leaders including Harrods managing director Michael Ward, Iceland managing director Richard Walker and River Island chair Clive Lewis proposed four ‘fixes’ to address the problem of business rates, which have piled ever greater pressure on retailers confronting harsh trading conditions.