Wilko confirms date 124 stores will close next week as collapsed retail giant vanishes from the high street for good

WILKO will close 124 stores in days – with hundreds more shuttered by October, administrators have revealed.

The bargain retail giant said the first 38 outlets will close this coming Sunday September 17 after last ditch rescue talks failed.

Wilko will close 124 stores in days – with over 300 more shuttered by October, administrators have revealedRex

A further 38 will close on Tuesday September 19 followed by 48 more by Thursday September 21.

Timings for the shuttering of the remaining 222 stores will be announced in due course.

It is anticipated that all stores will be closed by early next month, resulting in the redundancies of a further 9,100 employees in those stores.

The closure of distribution centre operations is expected to take place on Friday September 15, with the majority of the remaining 886 DC employees being made redundant on that date.

Further redundancies of the remaining 210 support centre employees will take place during September and early October as operations wind down.

Zelf Hussain, joint administrator overseeing the closure of Wilko, said: “Despite the significant and intensive efforts of both ourselves and Putman Investments – the remaining party interested in buying a significant part of the business as a going concern…

“A transaction could not be progressed due to the inability to reduce central infrastructure costs quickly enough to make a deal commercially viable.”