every job advertised. Financial data Numbers are in millions of pounds: Operations Next has three main channels: Next Retail, a chain of 550+ retail branches in the United Kingdom; Next Directory, a home shopping catalogue and website with more than 3 million active customers, and Next International, with 180+ international stores. Its other businesses include Next Sourcing, for own brand products; Lipsy, which designs and sells its own branded younger women's fashion products through wholesale, retail and website channels. Next operates stores and e-commerce for Victoria's Secret in the UK. In September 2021, Next announced a joint venture with Gap. Next will manage Gap's UK website and place Gap concessions in some Next stores. The deal preserves Gap's presence on the UK high street after Gap announced in July 2021 it would close all of its UK stores. In September 2018, the company's Irish operations profits were separated from Next plc. Next (Ireland) Ltd was formally established to focus on the distribution of products in its physical stores and its online store in the Republic of Ireland. At the same time Next Germany was established. In November 2022, it was announced Next had acquired the London-headquartered furniture retailer, Made.com - which (in the same month) had gone into administration. In December 2022, the company entered into a joint venture with Tom Joule to buy The Joules Group out of administration. Logos and marketing Until circa 1991 Next used a lower case Courier-style typeface in black against a white background for its logo. This was replaced by the capitalised NEXT logo in a Roman-serif style type face. There were some variations of this such as the logo with each letter of NEXT in an individual square and in some stores in 2005/2006 had the Next logo in a varying blue & black background with "X's" printed on them, as opposed to the black background. In addition, some variations in typeface occurred during the logo's use – including similar fonts that had serifs positioned above the "T" crossbar, similar to Garamond and others that had more in common with Times New Roman. In 2007 a new next logo was introduced, although the previous logo continued to be used until stock was exhausted. Next clothing often carries reference to the origins of the company in 1982 with use of "82" or "1982" as a design feature on clothes in all ranges. Prior to