From this afternoon's Mersey Magazine newsdesk


The Birkenhead branch of TJ Highes will close its doors for the final time in a fortnights time

The shop in the Grange Shopping Precinct, is one of four TJ Hughes stores nationally which will definitely be closed in the wake of the company going into administration

what a shame more people on the unemployed list and another shop/institute bite,s the dust, ive had some good bargains over the years from birkenhead/liverpool/chester/elesmere port..will be sadly missed!..

They must have lied to staff then, because my mate who has worked there for 5 years, adamant that they were informed by management that the "closing down" sale was just a marketing ploy, so they could clear the stocks ready for the new buyer (hence most of the stock isnt actually reduced lol), and that the Birkenhead store was safe!!

It's alright there's lots of jobs out there apparently !!

Well that's what the Prime Minister and his cronies said!

And it's not like they will be employed by Asda as they already have everyone including staff from other stores coming to work in Birkenhead once this Asda store opens!

looks like dirty tricks again from the managers then!. Thats how they do it now!.

It is a shame we also heard that the Liverpool store makes less then Birkenhead and they would go before Birkenhead, but I guess now Liverpool has a buyer they don't care.

I wonder what will happen will it be left empty, split in to units like Littlewoods or maybe move a big name into there? it is the towns main shopping walkway area.

The thing is TJ's was a bit like Woolworths sold everything under 1 roof and unless your called Tesco no one wants to know these days.

Shame, I've had some good bargains from TJs over the years. Was in the Liverpool store yesterday and chatted to one of the sales assistants. She said the London Rd store would stay open but was noncommittal about B'head.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-14408234

Of course they don't. It's the administrators job to minimise the financial losses. Someone has offered to buy it, but they can't then plow than money into the other stores to cover their losses.

I imagine Anil Juneja knows exactly what he's doing and wouldn't buy the store on London Road if he didn't think he could turn it around.

I also imagine he took a look at most of the local stores as an option and dismissed them for whatever reason, having had full access to the accounts, access that you and I don't have.

There's also the fact that Birkenhead is a mess.

Personally, I'd like to see a store there that I'd use, from a selfish point of view.

The loss of jobs is obviously the biggest shame here.

proberly told your mate the store wasnt closing so they didnt leave and find another job before the closure date and leave them short staffed,,, at least the long time staff should get a pay off till they find somewhere else,, it wont replace having a weekly or monthly wage though

Not sure on the pay off you know...

You can claim for all your outstanding pay from the insolvency practitioner. There is no guarantee that the full amount you are owed will be paid as this depends on whether enough funds are raised from the sale of your employer’s assets.

Some debts, including holiday pay and wages, will be 'preferential debt' when your employer’s assets are shared out. This means they must be paid before certain other debts.

As full payment cannot be guaranteed, there are special arrangements for employees to claim the basic minimum of debts owed to them from the National Insurance Fund. These claims are:

- redundancy
- wages - up to a maximum of eight weeks
- holiday pay - up to a maximum of six weeks
- compensatory notice pay - one week after one calendar month's service rising to one week per year of service up to a maximum of 12 weeks (new earnings will be taken into account)

There is a limit of £400 a week on the amount you can claim for your weekly pay.

I was in birkenhead before and went into tj,s,it looked like granda reports were there.

i was on the telly, i saw myself go across the screen

http://www.itv.com/granada/

thanks kathryn, i was the one going passed at 4 secs in sleeveless top.

Moment of fame

hair light5 coloured in a bob light sleevless cardi with pink top underneath is you?

im famous,,, thats me in the dark green jacket walking out the store in the first couple of seconds of the report

What I find most interesting, is the administrators managed to find the capital to have thousands of "closing down" banners printed!!

Very odd for administrators to start spending money like that, unless it the signs were printed before the company went into administration (which begs the question as to how long the executives knew it was going under for) - especially if they knew there was not enough revenue being generated to enable the company to remain trading without a buyer coming in.

I was in Poundstretcher yesterday, and thought to myself... TJ's the second. The other place along the same lines, would be B&M. So for fans of TJ's, all is not lost.

Tbh, a LOT of TJ's stock has been massively overpriced in recent years, especially the eletricals etc... one does wonder whether the execs of the company, have been buying in the stock from other companies they own, at vastly inflated prices.

Hello Mattlfc .I have heard that a person from Liverpool has bought only 4 of the main tj`s shops and the rest are going into recievership,And yes i also think that this has been on the cards for along time ,but it`s only now they`ve let the rest of the world know , your right any way how else could they have printed all the closing down banners off so fast

I think alot have Generic POS, as I have seen some shops who have gone bust use the same bannners as Woolworths when that closed.

I wouldn't say massively overpriced. I've done very well there for things like clothes, trainers, curtains. I'd quite often buy something from TJs in Birkenhead and walk down the road and see the exact same thing in the Officer's Club for three times the price.

Yeah, I agree some of the electricals weren't too competitively priced, but then that's an absolute cut-throat market. Having said that, I got a wall mounted living-flame effect electric fire from TJ's last year for 89 quid when every other retailer wanted 299 for the same model.

You just need to be a bit savvy about shopping and not assume everything in TJ's is the bargain it appears (appeared) to be.

Just noticed on the Wirral Globe website TJ's Birkenhead branch infact closes this Thursday 11th August, i thought it would be open for at least another week but nope it's sadly almost gone now..

I think i'll pop in on the last day if tonight's hooligans haven't burnt it down by then!

Yeah the lad at the checkout said that last week; to be honest, they would struggle for stock to stay open a week longer. There was too many staff there last week, considering the lack of stock they had.

went in tjs this morning hardly any stock left only ground floor was open

The TJ Hughes in Salford has closed immediately due to all its remaining stock being looted yesterday.

haha that'll be coz i went yesterday and now most of tjs is in my bedroom lol