FASHION brand Simply Be has chosen Liverpool as the site for its first high street store.

Parent company N Brown announced earlier this year that Simply Be, which sells fashionable clothes for plus-size women, was moving onto the high street for the first time.

The brand already generates annual sales of more than £100m through its website and catalogues.

And Alan White, chief executive of the Manchester-based home shopping group, told LDP Business that the first Simply Be store was to be in Liverpool.

He said: “We hope to get a couple of stores open this side of Christmas.

“We are hoping to conclude on one in the Liverpool One area.

“That will be our first major store.

“We are also negotiating on a store on the north side of Manchester,” he added.

“We wanted to have our first stores in the North West because all our managers and distributors are in the North West, so we can give the stores a lot of close attention.

“We want to open two or maybe three stores in September or October this year, then three or four next spring.

“Then we’ll evaluate it in 2012.”

N Brown also owns brands such as Jacamo and Marisota, as well as the High & Mighty chain of stores.

Mr White said the group had chosen to move the Simply Be brand onto the high street because it filled a gap in the fashion market.

He said: “This business is for the plus-size customer, but it’s the plus-size customer who wants high fashion.

“That customer’s natural shopping habitat is the high street, but they have a poor shopping experience at the moment.

“There’s nothing for the fashionable, plus-size customer.

“We have designed a shopping concept which we believe will not only generate sales in these stores but will also, by building the brand, give us an incremental increase in home shopping sales as well.”