Barnardo’s opens 89 charity shops and aims to be ‘biggest chain in the country’

29 Sep 2016 News

Barnardo’s opened 89 charity shops last year and has overtaken Oxfam to become the second largest charity retail chain in the UK, according to figures from the annual Charity Shops Survey, which will be published on Monday.

The Charity Shops Survey is sponsored by the Charity Retail Association and published by two Civil Society Media magazines, Charity Finance and Fundraising. This year it surveyed 75 charities with 6,933 shops and £847m of income – around two thirds of all shops in the UK.

The survey found that Barnardo’s had 672 shops as of the end of its last financial year, to March 2016, taking it into second place in the ranking of shop numbers.

It remains behind the British Heart Foundation, which had 735 shops at the same point, but has moved past Oxfam, which has 650, and Cancer Research UK, which has 592.

Oxfam and CRUK still remain ahead of Barnardo’s in terms of income. However Javed Khan, chief executive of Barnardo’s, said last week that his charity intends to keep growing its shops chain to become the largest in the UK, as part of a plan to more than double the surplus the charity generates from shops and fundraising.

“We’re clear in our ambition to be the biggest shops chain in the country,” he said.

Charity Finance and Fundraising magazine subscribers will receive a copy of the Charity Shops Survey with the October issues. It can be preordered here.

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