Marks & Spencer to close 60 clothing and home stores

London : Marks & Spencer has announced it will close about 60 clothing and home stores over the next five years, in an effort to turn around its struggling business.

Chief executive Steve Rowe, who began his M&S career as a Saturday worker in the Croydon store in the 1980s, earlier warned that he would have to take tough decisions to restore the retailer to its former glory.

Details of the restructure came as M&S reported an 88 per cent fall in pre tax profit to £25 million in the six month to the end of September as sales of clothing and food declined.

Rowe also outlined plans to shut 53 stores across 10 international markets - including 10 in China and seven in France, while pulling out of Belgium, Estonia, Hungary and Lithuania - putting around 2,100 jobs at risk

However, the company also said it will open 200 more Simply Food stores in the UK by 2019 as it tries to capitalise on the success of its food and drink products.

Chief executive Steve Rowe, who found that M&S had become too complex and inefficient in a review of the business after his appointment this year, said: “In May, we laid out a number of questions which we would answer as part of our strategic review.  We committed to creating a simpler business with customers at its heart, and taking action to start to recover our Clothing & Home business and continue to grow in Food."