Department store Stuttafords, the 159-year-old “Harrods of South Africa”, is closing down, victim of a global shift to online retail and a domestic economic slump that has put brands such as Ted Baker and Gap beyond its customers’ reach.
Mirroring the fortunes of once-mighty department stores in Europe and the United States, the doyenne of the South African high street during apartheid and the two decades since applied for protection from creditors in October.
However, attempts to revive its fortunes proved futile and creditors voted in June to wind up the unlisted firm by Aug. 1, with closing-down sales at its nine stores in South Africa, two in Botswana and one in Namibia.
In its flagship store in Johannesburg’s Sandton financial district, piles of naked mannequins lay in heaps next to bare shelves as the last few bargain hunters picked through trays of heavily discounted perfumes, make-up and clothes.