Brexit: John Lewis to resume N Ireland deliveries by the summer

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
Mar 11, 2021

John Lewis will resume delivering its products to Northern Ireland before the summer after it stopped doing so in December due to issues linked to Brexit.

Brexit problems weren’t only confined to UK companies exporting to mainland Europe with Northern Ireland also falling foul of issues around the border in the Irish Sea. This came about as part of the drive to avoid a hard border on the island of Ireland.

While the John Lewis Partnership annual report focused mainly on subjects such as the giant loss that it made and the fact that it will be closing some stores, the company also mentioned that it has seen limited impact from Brexit so far because of the preparations it made in advance and because of the terms of the Brexit trade deal. 

But the temporary cessation of deliveries to Northern Ireland was one major headache. Quite a few companies stopped delivering there late last year as the conclusion of the Brexit trade agreement came at the last minute and they had to plan for what could well have been the UK crashing out of the EU without a deal.

John Lewis is now making major internal changes to allow it to resume Northern Ireland deliveries, a move that's particularly important at a time when the company is pushing through a recovery programme and needs every sale it can get. There are almost two million people in Northern Ireland who have not had access to John Lewis products this year.