WHSmith has announced that its high street brand has been sold and plans to undergo a rebrand as TGJones.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The branch has been sold for \u00a376m to Modella Capital, the owners of popular high street store, Hobbycraft. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
It is currently unclear how this transaction will affect the Sheffield stores, but it has been confirmed that all stores, colleagues and assets will be moved under Modella Capital\u2019s ownership. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
A local customer told ShefNews: \u201cI think the name will be the main thing and people won\u2019t associate the new name with WHSmith because it\u2019s been going for so long now, but I don\u2019t think much will change if they\u2019re selling the same things.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Users on X have also shared their thoughts on the new name, claiming that it \u2018sounds like something out of a comedy show\u2019 and is \u2018utter madness to use a fake and made up name\u2019 after it was revealed that TGJones was selected to evoke a \u2018familiar, family-oriented feel\u2019 and is not a reference to any individual.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
WHSmith have said that their brand is not included in the sale and their travel branch of the business will continue under the WHSmith name. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Carl Cowling, Group Chief Executive, said: \u201cAs our travel business has grown, our UK high street business has become a much smaller part of the WHSmith Group. This is a pivotal moment for WHSmith as we become a business exclusively focused on travel.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The group have decided to focus on travel as 75% of its revenue and 85% of its trading profit has come from the travel branch of the business in the last financial year<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It is unclear how the rebrand of TGJones will change things, but WHSmith stores in airports, hospitals and train stations will remain unaffected.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
WHSmith has announced that its high street brand has been sold and plans to undergo a rebrand as TGJones.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":699,"featured_media":64462,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[415,21],"tags":[834,1760,15,38,658],"class_list":["post-64460","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community","category-news","tag-closure","tag-highstreet","tag-news","tag-sheffield","tag-shop"],"yoast_head":"\n