83% of department stores closed since 2016

Department stores departure

83% of high street department stores have closed in the last five years, according to a newly-released report. Only 79 stores remain across the UK’s largest chains such as Debenhams, BHS and House of Fraser, compared with 467 in 2016. The data highlights the change in consumer shopping habits, which has been accelerated by the pandemic, with landlords now working out how best to repurpose these large town centre spaces.

BA short-haul relaunch

British Airways is planning to launch a new short-haul carrier that will operate out of Gatwick from next summer, in response to consumer demand as travel restrictions gradually ease. BA’s short-haul routes out of Gatwick have been suspended through the pandemic, but they believe the new subsidiary will allow the airline to build a sustainable short-haul business, competing with the likes of EasyJet and Ryanair.

A whale of a time

A boy from London has made £290,000 after selling non-fungible tokens (NFTs) of a series of digital artworks he created, called Weird Whales. NFTs can be used to create a digital certificate of ownership of a piece of art that can be bought and sold. He created 3,350 digital emoji-type whale images, and is now holding the proceeds from the NFTs in the cryptocurrency Ethereum.