ANDOVER’S Homebase store is on course to become the retailer’s latest casualty with the branch set to close in the near future.

Signs have appeared at the Andover store, in Enham Arch Retail Park, touting a “store closing” sale and noting that “everything must go”.

Staff at the outlet that no date has been confirmed yet, but they believe the closure will happen in February.

The signs outside the store also note that the closure affects the Andover location only.

The Advertiser has contacted Homebase for a comment.

More than 50 Homebase stores have shut up shop in recent years.

A wave of closures were announced in August 2018, affecting 42 locations across the country. Then in July of this year it was revealed that another 15 outlets would cease trading.

The Newbury store was one of those to close down earlier this year. It means that Andover residents will have to travel to 17 miles to Winchester or 20 miles to Basingstoke to find their nearest Homebase store.

The closures capped off a tumultuous few years for the company. In February 2016, Homebase was sold for £340 million to Australia conglomerate Westfarmers – the firm behind Bunnings, the leading household hardware chain down under.

Westfarmers planned to rebrand the stores under the Bunnings name, but plans were nixed amidst mounting losses.

The company was then forced to pull the plug and sell the Homebase brand to Hilco Capital, a retail turnaround specialist, for just £1 in June of last year.

The Westfarmers venture was widely touted as one of the most "disastrous" acquisitions in retail history, according to experts.

Following the sale to Hilco Capital, a “comprehensive turnaround plan” was put into action. And for the six months ending December 30, 2018, the company announced a 22 per cent rise in gross profits and an 81 per cent decline in EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation) losses.

However stores have continued to close since then with the Andover branch set to become the latest to cease trading.