January 6, 2009 | posted by Michael Baxter in High Steet |

John Lewis had good news; rumours circulating about M&S are not good; Next seemed to have played a blinder; but the real fireworks were provided by Debenhams. In fact, shares in the retailer soared as its fireworks lit up the sky.

John Lewis is supposed to be one of those barometer stores. If it does well, then you know the High Street is in good shape; if it does badly, well, hit the panic button.

In Christmas week, sales at John Lewis soared by 20 per cent, with most of the extra business coming from its upmarket supermarket, Waitrose.

One of the theories doing the rounds is that this Christmas there have been less gift vouchers and more pressies. Maybe shoppers were scared to buy gift vouchers. After all, a gift voucher to buy products from a bankrupt company isn’t much use.

As for M&S, the rumour circulating was not any old rumour, it was a Marks and Spencer rumour, and it goes like this. The store is set to make 1,000 job cuts. Okay, we all know High Street jobs will be lost this year, but one would have hoped M&S employees were among the safest. So we will have to see how this rumour pans out.

As for Next, well it said it enjoyed its best ever trading day on the first day of the sales. Let’s repeat that, its best ever trading day. As for Christmas, it proudly boasted it managed to stick to its full price policy.

For the period July to Christmas Eve, like for like sales at the retailer were down 7 per cent, but these days that seems quite good.

Its chief executive, Simon Wolfson, raised a cheer when he said: “It’s going to be another tough year, but there are some positives.”

As for Debenhams, its chief executive Rob Templeman lit a beautiful firework, which soared, illuminating an otherwise gloomy High Street. Actually he didn’t say that much, merely that the retailer had enough money to meet its debt obligations later in the year. He went on to say the retailer would not need to refinance until 2011. And that was all it took. Debenhams is sitting on a £1bn debt pile, and investors have been getting nervous about that. As the Rob Templeman firework soared, shares in the retailer rose 31 per cent, and investors looked on gasping “ahhhh” and “ohhh”, with relief.