Yet another high street retailer collapses: Nearly 300 Virgin Mobile staff could be left without a job, after Zavvi fell into administration (a nice business term for crumbled or dead) just before Christmas.

The retailer has a total of 83 Virgin Mobile concessions in its 92 stores. A Virgin Mobile spokesman could not confirm whether the company’s remaining 270 staff will stay in their jobs if Zavvi fails to find a buyer (not likely at this point).

Zavvi’s administrators closed 22 Zavvi stores yesterday, of which five contained Virgin Mobile concession stores. The Virgin Mobile spokesman said the 11 staff in the stores have now been redeployed to Virgin media in various capacities.

Zavvi, which was formerly Virgin Megastore, was formed after a management buy-out of the Virgin Group division in 2007. It is (or was) the UK’s largest independent retailer, and it caps a series of months where another high street retailer, Woolworths, collapsed after almost 100 years in business. It hasn’t been pretty in the UK business scene of late, that’s for certain.

It is understood that Virgin tycoon Richard Branson still holds the lease on Zavvi’s Tottenham Court Road flagship site, as well as another five sites. Virgin said it does not intend to bring back Virgin Megastores and will sublet the sites to other retailers.

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