Job In Administration
Another UK Retailer Goes Bust: Diamonds & Pearls
The recession is pretty merciless when it comes to its victims – the only thing that’s inevitable is today’s economy is that if a business is not secure, it will go down. In the UK we’ve seen the demise of Woolworths and MFI in recent months. Now its the turn for diamond and pearl jewellery retailer Diamonds & Pearls. The Bedford-based company announced recently that they have gone into administration. More than 300 jobs are at risk as their 91 branches across the UK are threatened with closure.Worldwide accountancy firm KPMG have been given administration responsibilities. Myles Halley, and Richard Philpott, the administrators appointed by KPMG Restructuring, said they plan on selling up the business and are looking for a buyer.It was clear from their statement that this is going to lead to branch closures, and, in their words, “a number of redundancies”.
There goes yet another casualty of the 2009 economic crisis. Yet fairly recently the chain described itself as ‘one of the UK’s fastest growing fashion retailers’. So what exactly went wrong? Does this mean it’s set in stone that if you’re one of the smaller players in the retail industry, you will not survive? Not by a long shot. While Diamonds & Pearls’ physical stores may have been doing well in recent years, a quick look at their website, http://www.diamondspearls.co.uk, tells me all I need to know. Aside from being a pretty poorly designed site, when you click on “Online Shop” you get the message “Our Online Shop is currently under development, Please call back soon”! Hallelujah! Mystery over, as far as I’m concerned. By failing to support their business with a strong online presence and the ability to shop online, Diamonds & Pearls have really shot themselves in the foot. The one defining feature of consumer behaviour in the credit crunch is that people are going online to find the cheapest prices. It’s especially fundamental for small to medium retailers to take care of this. If you’re not in that sphere and holding your own, and trying to run your business purely on retail outlets alone, you’re almost guaranteed to fail. It even effects the biggest chains such as Woolworths, MFI and most recently Principles. What all of these had in common was they failed to act on the online shopping revolution and sort out their websites. If I was looking for information on saltwater pearls, or browsing for freshwater pearl jewellery for a Mother’s Day gift, the first thing I’d do is search for those things. Just as millions of web users would do – and Diamonds & Pearls would be nowhere to be seen. Retailers beware: this is the clearest example you’ll get, and if you fail to heed this advice you could be next.
Business Management and Administration Job Description