Beales last remaining department store to close

The last remaining Beales department store is set to close.

The store, at the Dolphin Centre shopping mall in Poole, will shut its doors at the end of May.

Beales chief executive, Tony Brown, said the minimum wage increase, together with a rise in employers' National Insurance Contributions (NICs) had added "exponential cost" to the business.

The NHS Outpatient assessment clinic on the top floor of the department store is not affected by the closure.

Mr Brown said: "We've looked at everything - these are not decisions you take likely.

"We looked at a whole raft of redundancies but to get to where we needed to be the shop itself wouldn't be able to open most of the time because we wouldn't have enough people.

"Obviously, it's devastating especially for the staff who have tried so hard over the last five years."

The Poole store reopened in the summer of 2020 after relocating to the shopping centre.

The NHS clinic was set up on the top floor in 2021 in a bid to reduce waiting lists and Mr Brown said the clinic "will carry on after we have left at the end of May".

The department store began trading in Bournemouth in 1881 and went on to have 23 shops.

Doors closed on stores across towns and cities after the retailer fell into administration in 2020.

You can follow BBC Dorset on Facebook, X, or Instagram.