How ‘boring’ Next took over the British high street – and its new big fashion move
Stick almost anything that is boring to buy but urgently needed – school shirts, a new set of underwear, a serviceable skirt for the office – into your internet search engine and chances are, the first thing that pops up will be from Next. The item in question will be reasonably priced, decent quality and if you want it, you can have it the next day, regardless of where in the country you live.
You might think of Next as a bit boring, but very useful and accessible to all. As, clearly, do most of Britain’s shoppers: the high street giant has just upgraded its forecasts for the third time since early August and now expects profits for this year to top £1 billion. Why? The early arrival of cold weather means winter coats and jumpers are urgently needed. And here’s Next to the rescue with a longline hooded padded coat in a range of colours for £50 and a wool cashmere crewneck by Reiss for £128, both of which can be with you by this time tomorrow.
“Next is all things to all people,” says former fashion editor and stylist Alexandra Fullerton of the high street behemoth’s success. Sure, its clothes might not be regularly featured in fashion magazines, or being breathlessly unboxed on TikTok, but the chain’s success lies in its unerring sense of what middle England wants: reliability, good value and something for everyone – whether that’s a new pair of jeans for your tall but skinny teenage boy, a nice lamp for the sitting room or a pack of socks for your husband.
When my sister got married in a last-minute ceremony the day before wedding guest numbers were slashed from 30 to 15 in 2020, I hightailed it to Next to find three pairs of matching shirts and trousers for my sons to wear as pageboys as I knew they’d have what I wanted. When I worked in London, I regularly popped into its Victoria station store to stock up on plain white leather trainers to wear to the office, and if my children need schoolwear and Next can get it to me faster than M&S, they get my business. Since moving out of London last year Next has become even more useful, stocking as it does a range of brands under one online roof that I can get more quickly and easily than shopping at all those places individually.
This combination of quality and reliability has been Next’s modus operandi since it launched in 1982. Its target customer, even then, was women over 25; early stores were designed with the clothes laid out so customers could see what went with what – a revolutionary concept at the time. The gamechanger was the launch of the company’s mail order arm, Next Directory in 1988, credited with making catalogue shopping aspirational and crucially, fast.
I remember flicking through its pages in the 1990s, turning over corners of the things I liked; early catalogues came with fabric samples attached and, amazingly, even then you’d get your order delivered in a couple of days. Then there were Next’s legendary Boxing Day sales, which became a cult-like event for thousands of Brits who would queue through the night for the chance to be first through the doors. Small wonder that, in the years since, this high-street tortoise has outpaced its hare-like rivals, becoming one of the most successful British retailers out there.
Under the guidance of CEO Lord Wolfson, Next has also expanded into snapping up struggling brands and bringing them under the company’s umbrella – the likes of Gap, Victoria’s Secret and Joules only remain in business because they’re operated by Next.
High fashion, however, Next is not and has never been. There might be a nod to a trend: a barrel-cut jean here, a smattering of leopard-print there, but the Next customer is more likely to be looking for a well-cut jacket from the likes of Reiss, or a classic Ralph Lauren knit, than searching for a high-street knock off of the fashion item du jour. “They’ve absolutely nailed the nice-top-to-wear-with-jeans and nice smart things to wear if you work in an office,” points out Fullerton, correctly.
Even the collaborations that Next has entered into over the years have been subtle, rather than high fashion – a hookup with whimsical label Shrimps in 2021 that featured tea dresses and kids’ rompers, a 47-piece Laura Ashley collection earlier this year with a smattering of easy to wear, pretty blouses and a Tabitha Simmons shoe collection that launched last week, featuring classic pointed loafers, on-trend but low key flat scalloped Mary-Janes in black or burgundy and wear-with-anything gold evening heels. Simmons, an in-demand stylist who works with the likes of Vogue, Dolce and Gabbana and Erdem, proved that even at the highest echelons of the fashion world, there are under-the-radar Next aficionados: “I have always wanted to collaborate with Next,” she said when her collection was announced. “I was always such a fan growing up and poring through the catalogues.”
“They’re things that you might buy anyway because they’re lovely, rather than queue up for at 6am,” says Fullerton of Next’s stealth style hits. Unlike, say, M&S’s collaboration with Bella Freud, which sold out within hours and is now available on resale sites for double the original price, the Tabitha Simmons x Next collection still has healthy availability online and is more likely to make its way into your wardrobe and stay there. This is stealth fashion: the sort that isn’t too edgy but will serve you well for several years.
Which is what Next is trying to do with its next big venture: the launch of a luxury e-commerce site.
Seasons, which launched on Thursday, features the likes of Marc Jacobs, Ganni, Rotate, By Malene Birger, Rixo and Ray-Ban, with the strapline “Where luxury meets lifestyle”. The 1000-odd pieces for sale – for men, women and children – are carefully curated, ranging from £18 for a pair of Varley socks to £1,775 for a Belstaff jacket. Crucially, as far as Next is concerned, all items are available to all its customers as quickly as everything else is: what the company describes as “a seamless shopping experience.”
“We see it as an addition to, and extension of, what we’re already doing, primarily to service the customer base we already have,” says Jade Taylor, brand director of Seasons. And why Seasons might succeed where the likes of Matches has failed and Net-a-Porter is struggling (the etailer was bought by Mytheresa last month) is because it will be available to women (and men) all round the country, not just the ones who live in London – i.e. the ones who are already loyal Next shoppers, and don’t tend to live in or around the capital.
“We have a high proportion of customers actively shopping and seeking out premium products,” explains Taylor. “The logical next step was to serve those customers even better.” So if you want a pair of Citizens of Humanity jeans or an APC handbag tomorrow but you live in the wilds of Scotland, you can still have it – as long as you order by 10pm. And if it doesn’t fit, there’s the home collection returns service, or the 500 existing returns points around the country.
Will it work? Well, there’s no doubt that Next has already nailed the online market, with 6.3 million customers, and about two-thirds of its sales made online. “When it comes to distribution, they really are best in class for the business,” says one business industry insider. That early investment in mail order infrastructure – warehousing, distribution and logistics – puts Next miles ahead of its competitors. When high-street shopping started moving online, and in today’s instant gratification consumer market, the ability to get something quickly and be able to take it back easily if it doesn’t work is worth far more to its customers than being at the front of the fashion pack.
In a world of online overwhelm, meanwhile, there is also potential value in a relatively tight edit of pieces. The Seasons offering follows the general Next model – not too directional; things that will show you’re fashion conscious rather than a fashion victim and that you can wear for several years running – but without the sheer volume of the main site, which can feel a bit too much when a search for a jumper throws up multiple pages of offerings.
Here, by contrast, there’s a 25-piece edit of Ganni items: you can buy one of the brand’s classic leopard-print dresses for £235 or keep it simple with a £115 T-shirt. The pieces aren’t bonkers money, but are reassuringly expensive: a black puff-sleeved midi dress by Scandinavian brand Rotate for £305; a rust brown Barbour x Alexa Chung padded jacket for £199. It’s the sort of stuff that The Telegraph’s men’s style editor Stephen Doig says his Scotland-based, Next-loving sister would love. “She’ll buy ‘fashion’ pieces from Harvey Nichols Edinburgh and has the Chanel bag and the Prada shoes, but for everyday pieces she relies on Next, for ease of delivery and for basics that she knows work,” he says. “Plus she likes the fact that there are lots of brands on there under one roof, with delivery that she can rely on.”
A ripe target for Seasons, then – and one more player in Next’s quest to take over the high street.
