Co-op cleared to absorb Southern Co-op: the 15 stores being sold

The Co-operative Group’s takeover of Southern Co-op has been cleared by the Competition and Markets Authority, ending a review that had hung over one of the biggest shake-ups in British convenience retail this year. The price is the sale of 15 convenience stores and two funeral homes in southern England, and the CMA’s legally binding undertakings, published on Thursday 5 November 2026, name every one of them.

Most coverage of the decision has stopped at the headline numbers. The more useful detail for shoppers sits in the annex to the undertakings: which shops are going, what a buyer must promise, and what happens if nobody suitable comes forward. Co-op says there are no immediate changes to membership benefits or rewards, and that both societies will keep trading as normal while migration plans are finalised.

What did the CMA decide on 5 November?

The CMA’s case page records that on 5 November it accepted undertakings in lieu of a reference to Phase 2, offered by Co-operative Group Limited over its completed acquisition of The Southern Co-operative Limited. In plain English, the regulator has agreed to take a package of store sales instead of opening a full in-depth investigation. The full text of the decision has not yet been published; the CMA says it will follow shortly.

The Press Association described the deal as cleared after Co-op agreed to offload 15 stores and two funeral homes. Talking Retail, Convenience Store and Better Retailing all reported the same outcome on Thursday afternoon, and the specialist competition service MLex reported the acceptance shortly after midday. Co-op’s own statement calls the decision approval to begin bringing the two societies together.

Kate Allum, Co-op Group’s interim chief executive, said: “CMA approval gives us the green light to begin an exciting new chapter of co-operation.” Ben Stimson, chief executive of Southern Co-op, said: “Our priority is to maintain our shared values and strengthen the co-operative movement as we join forces in earnest.”

The decision closes a question that the CMA opened in September when it flagged 19 stores in local overlaps. Both societies conceded that finding rather than contest it and asked for the case to be fast-tracked to a remedies discussion. The CMA provisionally accepted their offer on 29 September, consulted from 12 October and took comments until 27 October.

Which 15 Co-op and Southern Co-op stores are being sold?

Annex A of the final undertakings lists the 15 grocery sites by name and postcode. The table below sets them out alongside the overlap that appears to explain each sale. The CMA’s documents list the affected areas and the sale sites separately, so the last column is shopappy’s reading of the two lists, matched by postcode and town, and not a pairing published by the regulator.

Shop being sold	Postcode	Current owner	Overlap named by the CMA (shopappy’s reading)
The Parade, Wittering, West Sussex	PO20 8BL	Southern Co-op	Co-op Group, Bracklesham Lane, Bracklesham Bay
Rose Green Road, Bognor Regis	PO21 3EQ	Southern Co-op	Co-op Group, The Parade, Pagham
New Haw Road, Addlestone	KT15 2DS	Southern Co-op	Co-op Group, The Broadway, New Haw
Woodbridge Road, Guildford	GU1 4RN	Southern Co-op	Co-op Group, High Street, Guildford
Weston Road, Portland	DT5 2BY	Southern Co-op	Co-op Group, Easton Square, Portland
Cromwell Road, Whitstable	CT5 2AA	Southern Co-op	Co-op Group, Oxford Street, Whitstable
Seymour Lane, North Baddesley	SO52 9FN	Southern Co-op	Co-op Group, Botley Road, North Baddesley
Faversham Road, Lenham	ME17 2PN	Southern Co-op	Co-op Group, Buckingham Drive, Harrietsham
Long Lane, Holbury	SO45 2LG	Southern Co-op	Area centred on this shop
The Square, Westbourne	PO10 8UE	Southern Co-op	Area centred on this shop
Crosier Close, Old Sarum	SP4 6GX	Southern Co-op	Area centred on this shop
Welcome, Denvilles, Havant	PO9 2FE	Southern Co-op	Area centred on this shop
Welcome, Stubbington, Fareham	PO14 3LJ	Southern Co-op	Area centred on this shop
Bridge Yard, Bradford on Avon	BA15 1EJ	Co-op Group	Southern Co-op, Winsley Road, Bradford on Avon
Barnham Road, Barnham	PO22 0HB	Co-op Group	Southern Co-op, Main Road, Arundel (BN18 0EY)

Why most of the sold shops carry the Southern name

Thirteen of the 15 sites are Southern businesses, including two that trade under the Welcome name. Only Bradford on Avon and Barnham come from the national group’s own estate. The result is that in most of these towns and villages the national Co-op stays and the Southern shop passes to somebody else.

The CMA did not ask for every overlapping shop to be sold. Its test was whether a local area would be left with too few rival brands. It looked at a five-minute drive or a one-mile radius around each convenience store, and raised concerns where the merger cut the number of competing brands from five to four or fewer.

Co-op Group says it has 2,300 food stores and Southern Co-op 173, a simple total of 2,473. Selling 15 therefore removes about 0.6% of the combined store count. That small percentage is exactly why the decision matters locally rather than nationally: the shops affected are often the village or neighbourhood option, and the group itself said in September that the CMA had found no concern at a national level.

Which funeral homes must go, and why?

The remedy also covers two Southern funeral sites: The Co-operative Funeralcare in Alton (GU34 1AB) and JB Hall Funeral Directors (RG41 2NU). Here the CMA drew its catchments much wider, at a 15-minute drive around each site, and raised concerns where the merger cut the number of rival brands from four to three.

The JB Hall sale shows the regulator pushing back. According to its consultation notice, Co-op Group first offered only a different Southern site in the area around its Earley branch, in Reading, but the CMA had “material doubts” that selling that site would work. It preferred JB Hall, the larger of Southern’s two overlapping sites, because it restores the number of rival brands and leaves no material concern about the buyer’s ability to compete.

Families who hold pre-paid plans with either business should note one detail in that notice: the proposed sales do not include customer contracts. No statement has been published explaining how existing plans will be handled at the two sites. Anyone affected should ask their plan provider in writing rather than assume the plan moves with the building.

Will the shops close or simply change hands?

This is the question residents are already asking. The Sussex Express reported in October that people in East Wittering were worried about their shops, and that Co-op confirmed it had no plans to close either local store as a result of the merger. The Parade shop is still on the sale list, and a Co-op spokesperson stressed that a sale does not automatically mean a closure, with the intention being that shops transfer to new owners and carry on trading.

Campaigners are less reassured. The Save Our South Coast Alliance, in a Facebook post reported by the Sussex Express, argued that forcing the sale of a working village supermarket does the opposite of protecting consumer choice. “If a buyer isn’t approved or the units end up closing, we lose a vital lifeline, jobs disappear, and consumer choice is completely destroyed,” the group said, naming The Parade in East Wittering and The Square in Westbourne.

What a buyer must promise

The undertakings set a real test. A purchaser must be independent of Co-op Group, approved by the CMA, and have the money, expertise, incentive and intention to run the business as a viable and active competitor in that local area. That last requirement is repeated as a warranty in the sale agreement, which makes a simple property sale to a non-retail buyer very hard to square with the terms.

Co-op Group must also use all reasonable endeavours to move key staff with each business, including replacement store managers where a buyer needs them. Employees working exclusively at those sites form part of what is being sold. For a shopper, that raises the realistic prospect of familiar staff behind the till in a shop with a different name above the door.

What will not transfer to a new owner

The CMA’s consultation notice says the sales will not include supply contracts, customer contracts, leased assets, intellectual property rights or back-office support. The notice does not spell out the consequences for shoppers, but the implication is fairly plain. A sold shop should be expected to lose the Co-op name, Co-op own-brand supply and Co-op membership benefits, because those belong to the seller and would be replaced by whatever the buyer brings.

Nothing in the published papers says who that will be. According to the notice, Co-op Group gave evidence that a “considerable number” of competitor grocery retailers had shown initial interest in one or more of the shops. That was enough for the CMA to decide it did not need to approve buyers before accepting the deal, so the sale process only starts in earnest now.

What happens if no buyer appears

The undertakings contain a hard backstop. If Co-op Group fails to sell in line with its commitments, the CMA can appoint a trustee with an exclusive mandate to sell at no minimum price to an approved purchaser. A further fall-back mechanism exists for sites that prove difficult to sell, but its terms are redacted, and a footnote in the notice links part of it to the two Co-op Group shops at Bradford on Avon and Barnham.

That trustee power gives the regulator leverage, but it cannot manufacture a retailer who wants a small shop on a short lease. The CMA itself acknowledged that the remaining lease on some of the sites is “relatively short”, though it said it did not believe that would affect their viability or commercial attractiveness, given the fall-back terms. The names of those sites have not been published.

There is a recent precedent for a store dropping out of this process. After Morrisons bought McColl’s, it was required to sell a Martin’s-branded shop at 36 High Street in Pewsey, but the landlord intended to convert the premises to residential use and would not let them to a grocery retailer. In October 2023 the CMA removed that site from the undertakings, a useful reminder that a remedy can be undone by the person who owns the building.

What changes for Co-op and Southern Co-op members?

Nothing immediately, according to both societies. Co-op’s statement says there are no immediate changes to membership benefits or rewards, and Better Retailing reports that migration timelines will vary across different parts of the organisations. No end date has been published for the separate member schemes.

Southern Co-op’s April member information pack gives the fullest picture of where this is heading. Members become individual members of Co-op Group, keeping the right to vote and stand for election, and each society’s members keep their existing benefits for a period. Over time, the pack says, the two propositions will be brought together in a “single and simpler” combined offer.

Question	What has been said	What has not been said
Can I still use my Southern Co-op card?	Yes. Southern said in May that members keep their card and usual benefits during the process	The date a single card or app takes over
Will my rewards change?	No immediate change, per Co-op’s 5 November statement	How Southern’s rewards convert into the group scheme
Will I still get a dividend?	The April pack says current benefits continue for a period, then a combined offer follows	Any future dividend level or date
Will my shop be rebranded?	Southern is still trading under its own name through a subsidiary, Siena Co-operative Limited	Any rebranding timetable
Do I keep a vote?	Yes. Members become Co-op Group members with democratic rights	How regional representation will work in the enlarged society

Co-op Group already sells its membership on price, including 135 essentials price-matched to Aldi for members, according to The Grocer. Southern members will reasonably want to know whether that deal reaches their local shop, and how it compares with what they receive now. Neither society has yet set out that comparison, so members should treat early social media claims with caution until formal details are issued.

The membership figure itself varies by source. Co-op’s statement gives 7.5 million members, the Press Association’s intro uses seven million and Southern’s July statement also said seven million. Either way, Southern’s roughly 330,000 members are a small addition, at under 5% of the total.

Why did Southern Co-op need this deal at all?

This was never a merger of equals. In April, chief executive Ben Stimson and chair Janet Paraskeva told members that “the most likely outcome” without the deal was administration, adding that the society had relied on banks and suppliers to keep operating and had received no offers of funding at the level required. They said no solvent alternative could be delivered in the time available.

The numbers in the member information pack explain the alarm. Southern reported a pre-tax loss of £4.5m on sales of £543.9m in the year to 26 January 2025, after a £2.6m loss on sales of £545.8m the year before. By the time of the pack, its operating loss, subject to audit, was “in excess of £20m”.

The society also pointed at a specific blow. It said the cyber attack on Co-op Group in 2025 had hit both societies, and that its own trading had declined further afterwards. Southern and the Group already worked together through the Federal Retail Trading Society buying group, which helps explain why a shock at one reached the other.

The buyer is not in rude health either

Co-op Group is hardly coasting. Its half-year results for the 26 weeks to 4 July showed an underlying loss of £45m, widening from £32m, even as revenue rose 2.4% to £5.61bn and food retail sales rose 2.6% to £3.7bn. Net debt excluding leases fell from £317m to £239m, and Retail Gazette reported that the group’s convenience market share had risen to 13%.

Allum has called the Southern deal a “key cornerstone” of second-half growth, according to The Grocer, while saying the search for a permanent chief executive has no fixed timeframe. That matters here: the integration of a loss-making regional society will be led, for now, by an interim boss at a group that is itself in recovery. The table below sets out what is being combined.

Measure	Co-op Group	Southern Co-op
Food stores	2,300	173, plus 77 Welcome franchise stores
Funeral homes	800	69, plus 3 crematoria and 4 burial grounds
Members	7 million to 7.5 million, depending on the statement	About 330,000
Other businesses	Wholesale supplying about 8,000 outlets, legal services, insurance	83 Starbucks coffeehouses
Latest financial marker	£45m underlying loss on £5.61bn revenue (26 weeks to 4 July 2026)	£4.5m pre-tax loss on £543.9m sales (year to 26 January 2025)
Sites sold under the remedy	2 shops	13 shops and 2 funeral homes

How does this compare with past CMA grocery store sales?

The outcome fits a well-worn pattern. When a grocery merger raises local rather than national concerns, the CMA usually takes a package of named store sales at Phase 1 and avoids the months and cost of a full inquiry. The regulator’s parallel work on the land deals used by Aldi and Lidl rests on the same premise, that grocery competition is won and lost catchment by catchment.

Case	Accepted or decided	Local concern	Outcome
Co-op Group / Nisa Retail	23 April 2018	None requiring a remedy	Cleared at Phase 1 with no store sales
Morrisons / McColl’s	27 October 2022	35 local areas	28 shops to be sold; Pewsey later removed
Asda / Arthur Foodstores (from Co-op Group)	30 May 2023	Local overlaps	13 sites sold between 14 November 2023 and 31 January 2024
Co-op Group / Southern Co-op	5 November 2026	19 grocery areas and 2 funeral areas	15 shops and 2 funeral homes to be sold

Two things stand out from that history. Co-op Group knows this process from the other side, having sold Arthur to Asda, which then had to find buyers for 13 sites. In that case, the sales finished roughly eight months after the CMA accepted the undertakings, and the case was only formally closed on 1 February 2024.

The ratio of sale sites to problem areas also looks familiar. Morrisons offered 28 shops to resolve 35 areas, because one sale can fix more than one catchment. Here, 15 shops answer 19 areas, which is why North Baddesley, Portland and Bradford on Avon each appear on the CMA’s list twice, once for each society’s shop, while requiring only one sale.

What does a bigger Co-op mean for rival convenience shops?

The largest effect could be on the buyers rather than the sellers. Fifteen trading convenience stores across southern England are coming to market with a regulator requiring a sale, which is an unusual opportunity for regional multiples, symbol group retailers or a supermarket’s convenience arm. Any buyer will need to pass the CMA’s own competition test, which rules out a purchaser that would simply create a new local overlap.

For independent retailers trading nearby, the picture is mixed. A sold shop may pass to a sharper local operator or to a bigger chain with more buying power. Either way, it lands on a sector already under pressure, as the ACS Local Shop Report showed when it tracked rates bills and stalled investment across the sector.

The price war in the background

Scale is the argument Co-op has made throughout. Allum says the combined society will have “greater scale, resilience” and the ability to deliver more for members, and the Group has been spending to defend its position: its half-year loss partly reflected investment in promotions and in stores. Quick-commerce sales grew 24% in the first half and now reach 90% of its stores, according to Retail Gazette, which gives the group an online convenience capability it can in principle extend across a larger estate.

No such extension has been announced for Southern’s shops, and the societies have not published any savings target for the integration. The wider market is not standing still either, as Asda’s appointment of former Morrisons boss David Potts showed this week. Anyone comparing convenience prices should remember that the merger’s promised benefits are, so far, statements of intent and not published price commitments.

There is also a question of identity. The co-operative movement has long presented regional societies as closer to their communities, a theme explored in shopappy’s look at how modern member-owned stores work. Southern, founded in Portsmouth in 1873, is giving up its independence, and how much of its local character survives will depend on integration decisions that have not yet been announced.

What happens next, and which dates matter?

The undertakings took effect on 5 November, the date they were signed and accepted. The main sale deadline, known as the Divestment Period, is redacted. However, the text says that where a signed agreement is in place by the end of that period, completion must take place within seven months of the effective date, which on shopappy’s reading puts an outer marker at about 5 June 2027.

Once the sites are gone, the separation is long-lasting. Co-op Group cannot buy back any of the divested businesses, or an interest in them, for 10 years after the sale unless the CMA agrees in writing. The case page still shows the inquiry as open, and on past practice it should remain so until the sales complete.

Date	Step	Status
8 April 2026	Merger proposal announced	Done
6 and 21 May 2026	Southern members vote; more than 16,091 take part in the second vote, per Southern	Done
26 July 2026	Southern transfers into Siena Co-operative Limited, a Co-op Group subsidiary	Done
15 September 2026	CMA finds competition concerns in local areas	Done
29 September 2026	CMA says the offer might be acceptable	Done
12 to 27 October 2026	Public consultation on proposed undertakings	Done
5 November 2026	Final undertakings accepted	Done
Shortly	CMA publishes its full acceptance decision	Awaited
Undated	Buyers proposed and approved by the CMA	Awaited
About June 2027	Seven-month backstop for completing sales	Shopappy’s reading

Three things are worth watching. The full decision should show whether consultation responses, including any from village campaigners, moved the CMA at all. The first buyer announcements will reveal whether the sites are going to established grocers or smaller operators, and any notice of a trustee would be the clearest early sign of trouble. Shoppers can check updates on the CMA’s case page for the merger.

Frequently asked questions

Has the Co-op and Southern Co-op merger been approved?

Yes. On 5 November 2026 the CMA accepted undertakings from Co-op Group instead of referring the deal to a Phase 2 investigation. The approval depends on the sale of 15 convenience stores and two funeral homes.

Which Co-op stores are being sold?

The sites are at Wittering, Bognor Regis (Rose Green Road), Addlestone, Guildford (Woodbridge Road), Portland, Whitstable, North Baddesley, Lenham, Holbury, Westbourne, Old Sarum, Denvilles, Stubbington, Bradford on Avon (Bridge Yard) and Barnham. The first 13 are Southern businesses and the last two are Co-op Group shops.

Are these Co-op stores closing?

They are being sold, not closed, under the terms of the undertakings. Co-op says the intention is that they transfer to new owners and keep trading, but campaigners warn closure is a risk if suitable buyers cannot be found.

Who is buying the Co-op stores?

No buyers have been named. The CMA says Co-op Group gave evidence of initial interest from a considerable number of competitor grocers, and each purchaser must be independent and approved by the regulator.

Can I still use my Southern Co-op membership card?

Yes. Southern said members keep their card and usual benefits while the process continues, and Co-op said on 5 November that there are no immediate changes to benefits or rewards. A combined offer is expected in time, but no date has been published.

Will a sold shop still accept Co-op membership?

That is unlikely to continue once the sale completes, although neither society has confirmed the details. The CMA’s notice says the sales exclude supply contracts and intellectual property, so a new owner would be expected to trade under its own arrangements.

What happens to staff at the stores being sold?

Employees working exclusively at those sites are included in the sale, and Co-op Group must use all reasonable endeavours to transfer key staff, including store managers. Southern’s staff moved to the group’s subsidiary in July under TUPE rules, which protect existing terms of employment.

Why did the CMA investigate the merger?

It found that in 19 local grocery areas and two funeral areas, the two societies were close enough that the merger could leave people with less choice. It found no need for a remedy on the use of Southern’s crematoria, and Co-op says no concern was found at a national level.

When will the stores be sold?

No date has been published and the main deadline is redacted. The undertakings do set a seven-month limit from 5 November for completing sales already agreed, which points to around early June 2027.