Marks And Spencer café shake-up: Full list of closures and Waterlooville site repurposed into larger foodhall amid expansion plans
Marks And Spencer is pressing ahead with store growth even as several on-site cafés have shut in recent months, and the retailer will repurpose the Waterlooville café at Wellington Retail Park into a larger foodhall next month. The move highlights a strategic shift toward bigger food-focused stores; marks and spencer says the change is intended to offer customers a wider food range.
Marks And Spencer expansion and the Waterlooville closure
The Waterlooville café will be converted into a larger foodhall to accommodate an expanded range of food products, including an increased offering of Select Farms produce. Rebecca Rabadia, Regional Manager at M&S, explained that customer demand for a wider selection of food prompted the decision and that the in-store team will continue working to serve customers during the change. The repurposing is scheduled to take place next month.
Full list of Marks And Spencer cafe closures across the UK
Recent months have seen a number of on-site cafés close as part of the retailer's reconfiguration. The locations explicitly confirmed as closed in the provided context are:
- Crawley
- Dunblane
- Stirling
- Congleton
- Waterlooville (Wellington Retail Park) — being repurposed into a larger foodhall
Store growth plans and jobs
The retailer has plans to open 20 new or renewed stores between November 2025 and March 2026. Those openings are expected to create 800 jobs as part of a wider effort to double the brand’s footprint by opening new stores across the country.
Site requirements and the 500-location shortlist
An updated brochure of requirements sets out criteria for all new sites: each must be at least 21, 500 square feet, be in a highly visible location, offer easy access to major roads and provide dedicated parking. A list of 500 potential locations has been published, with several Hampshire sites included on that list: Portsmouth, Waterlooville, Bishops Waltham, Locks Heath/Fareham, Chandler’s Ford, Basingstoke, Fleet, Hook and Petersfield.
Executive outlook on food store strategy
Senior management views the performance of new food-focused stores as validation for further expansion. Alex Freudmann, managing director of M&S Food, has highlighted confidence in exploring more locations across the country, explicitly naming Elgin and Exmouth as examples of the geographic range under consideration. Leadership is seeking sites capable of supporting a large food store to deliver what it describes as the right shopping experience, range and availability for customers.
These developments frame a clear strategic pivot: reducing some café footprints while reallocating space to larger food halls and accelerating store openings that meet stringent size and access criteria. The full list of the closures included above and the published shortlist of potential new locations illustrate how the programme is unfolding on the ground.
