HMV will leave its flagship at 363 Oxford Street in March 2027, less than four years after reopening it. The music and entertainment chain says its landlord has proposed doubling the rent and that the building needs substantial renovation, which together make the shop commercially unviable. Sales at the store had risen 25% year on year.
The closure was announced on 12 October 2026 and reported by the BBC and Retail Gazette. HMV first opened on the Oxford Street site in 1921. It closed in 2019, when HMV went into administration, and reopened in November 2023 after a deal with the landlord. More than 50 staff work at the store. HMV says it will try to move them to its other London stores and its head office. HMV is a company-run chain, not a franchise network, so the lease sat with the company rather than with an operator, as it would across the brands recruiting partners in the UK.
A doubled rent the store could not absorb
HMV attributes the decision to occupancy costs rather than trading. Two factors made the shop unviable, it says: the landlord’s proposal to double the rent and the cost of “substantial” works to the building, which HMV would have had to fund. The landlord has not been named. Sales at Oxford Street had risen 25% year on year.
Phil Halliday, managing director of HMV, said: “This is a special store; it’s where we began 100 years ago.” He called it “frustrating” that the site had been made commercially unviable, adding that “regardless of how much a location means to us, it has to make commercial sense”. The 2023 return had itself depended on a deal with the landlord, struck after four years away from the site, and Halliday told the BBC that reopening the store had been “a big moment in our recent history”.
The wider chain is still growing
Across the rest of the estate, HMV reports growth. It told Retail Gazette that like-for-like sales rose 15% in the first nine months of 2026. It expects UK turnover above £240 million this year, compared with £212 million in 2025 and £165 million in 2019. The two reports give different store counts. Retail Gazette cites 123 UK stores, while the BBC gives 113 UK stores, including six trading as Fopp, plus eight in Europe. Online sales are forecast at £50 million for 2026, and a new website and warehouse are due in March 2027. HMV expects its European shops to contribute a further £15 million. The company says it remains committed to high street stores.
Good to know
HMV’s figures come from the company’s own statements to the press. They are not drawn from published accounts or a stock exchange announcement.
A replacement flagship planned for 2027
HMV says it is negotiating for a new flagship in London’s West End and plans to open it in 2027. It intends to keep what it calls a “significant presence” in the capital, and it hopes to move Oxford Street staff to the new store once it opens. In this case, rent and building works decided the flagship’s future while the shop itself was trading up, occupancy costs that in a franchised network fall on the operator rather than the brand, as what a franchise is explains. The new site has not been named.
