The British Heart Foundation is to close about 150 shops and cut jobs, as rising costs and the shift to online shopping makes about a quarter of the charity’s high street locations commercially unsustainable.
The charity carried out a review of its retail arm, which employs almost 3,700 staff, after net profit across its 640 UK stores plunged from £18.8m in 2024 to £3.6m in the year to 31 March 2025.
“Like most retailers, we are facing an exceptionally challenging trading environment,” said Charmaine Griffiths, the chief executive of the British Heart Foundation (BHF). “We know this will be a difficult time for our dedicated colleagues and volunteers in affected stores and emphasise our deep appreciation and gratitude for all they have done for BHF and the communities they serve.”
The charity, which gave Griffiths a £35,000 pay rise to £268,239 for this financial year, also said it was planning to cut jobs in “central functions that support our retail operation”.
BHF employs 795 staff at its head office and a total of 4,545 employees, equating to 3,692 on a full-time equivalent basis.
The charity’s wage and pension bill hit £136m last year, and 180 staff are paid £60,000 or more, according to the latest annual report.
BHF said that it intends to close 90 stores by the end of March next year and the remainder by the following March.
“We must act now to ensure a sustainable future for BHF retail,” said Allison Swaine-Hughes, the chief commercial officer at the charity. “This is about protecting our mission for the long term, even when the decisions in the shorter term are hard.”
BHF said that overall its financial position “remains healthy”, although the proportion of income it allocates to charitable work dropped last year.
It reported total income of £181m in 2025 but a fall of almost £9m in net income, after deducting direct costs, to £129.6m.
“Overall the ratio of income available for charitable activities reduced to 72%, a decrease from 77% in the previous year, but still above our benchmark of allocating 70p of every £1 towards our lifesaving work,” the company said in its annual report.
“Cardiovascular disease remains one of the UK’s biggest killers and our priority is funding research to save lives,” Griffiths said. “We must take the difficult step to close some of our shops to sustain retail’s important contribution to funding BHF’s groundbreaking research.”
