Marks and Spencer has said the shop on Walworth Road will definitely close this summer, company bosses confirmed this week,
The 111-year-old store has seen a consistent decline in sales in recent years, an M&S spokesperson told the News.
Company bosses had already said a closure was likely but a letter written to MP Neil Coyle and The Walworth Society has confirmed it.
The letter from M&S’s Corporate Communications department said: ‘We are now in a position to confirm that the closure will go ahead and we have updated our colleagues this morning with a provisional closure date of 8th June.”
It also said closing a store was ‘never and easy decision… particularly one where we’ve had a long history’.
Local shoppers, some of whom remembered visiting the store as children in the ‘60s, were gutted when Southwark News revealed Edwardian-era store was set to close.
They said Walworth Road already had a lack of high-quality retail and that friendly staff knew their customers on a first-name basis.
Petitions calling for it to stay open have garnered around 3,500 signatures.
The nearest M&S stores are in King’s College Hospital, Denmark Hill, and Brixton, but only the latter has a clothing department.
On Friday, April 10, Bermondsey and Old Southwark MP Neil Coyle will visit the store at 8.30am to receive the petition from the Walworth Society.
Gordon Scott, M&S Regional Manager, said: “We would like to thank all of our customers who have shopped in the store over the years, who we will keep serving up until closure and beyond that, from our other stores nearby and across London.
“After consulting with our colleagues, we have informed them of the closure and our priority now is continuing individual discussions about what this decision means for them.
“Wherever possible, we will offer them alternative roles with M&S. We’re rotating our store estate to make sure we have the right stores with the right space to offer customers a brilliant shopping experience and we are keen to explore suitable alternative sites in the local area.
“London is a hugely important area for us at M&S and in the past two years, we have invested over £23 million in our stores across the capital.”