Mary Hanbury
Mary Hanbury covers the business of retail and fashion through the lens of corporate strategy and consumer behavior at Business Insider. She is an editor on the business news team, working with reporters across sectors including retail, technology, finance, transportation, careers, and real estate. Her earlier work as a senior retail reporter, focused on apparel, luxury brands, fitness chains, big-box retailers, and grocery, anchors her fashion coverage in the realities of margins, store formats, and supply chains rather than trends alone. Across her portfolio she moves between data-led explainers, corporate news analysis, visual features, and comparison shopping pieces, keeping fashion stories grounded in how companies make money and how shoppers actually experience brands.
Luxury fashion is booming
Hanbury’s work on luxury fashion treats high-end labels as a barometer of the wider economy rather than a niche lifestyle beat.
In her piece on the boom in luxury fashion, she uses sales data to show that spending on expensive apparel and footwear in the United States has surged, highlighting brands such as Gucci whose sales nearly doubled over a recent period. She sets this growth against pressures on the American middle class, arguing that the success of luxury brands reveals a divide between affluent shoppers and everyone else. Her profile of the billionaire family behind fast-fashion giant Boohoo similarly balances the story of their lavish lifestyles with the company’s rapid expansion and the allegations that workers at some suppliers were paid about $4 an hour.
By pairing luxury growth with fast-fashion labor issues, she shows how wealth, working conditions, and brand image intersect in both premium and budget segments of the apparel industry. These stories illustrate a consistent approach: fashion is a way into questions of inequality, corporate governance, and the long-term viability of retail business models.
50 haunting photos of abandoned shopping malls
Hanbury covers the physical side of retail change through visual reporting on shuttered malls and failing shopping centers.
Her feature on the “American retail apocalypse” uses 50 photos of abandoned malls across the country to document what happens to retail spaces when anchor tenants leave and foot traffic collapses. By focusing on places such as Carousel Mall in San Bernardino, which closed after losing major anchors, she shows how store closures ripple out into empty corridors, boarded-up storefronts, and stalled redevelopment. The piece sits alongside her broader coverage of declining and struggling chains, including work on gym closures at 24 Hour Fitness and other store networks under stress.
Together these stories frame retail real estate, store layout, and occupancy as central parts of the fashion and retail narrative, not just scenery, and they underline her interest in structural change rather than one-off bankruptcies.
We went shopping at TJ Maxx and at its sister store in the UK
Hanbury frequently reports from inside stores to compare how different retailers present value, assortment, and brand image to shoppers. In her comparison of TJ Maxx in the US with its sister off-price store in the UK, she contrasts the more orderly British version with the American format, using a store walk-through to show differences in merchandising, layout, and overall shopping experience.
Her side-by-side look at Ross Stores and TJ Maxx similarly breaks down how each chain displays inventory, manages clutter, and signals discounts, giving a detailed view of the off-price model that goes beyond headline sales growth.
She extends this line of reporting to chains such as Nordstrom Rack, examining how inventory problems and the relationship to a full-price parent brand can become liabilities rather than strengths. These pieces show a reporter who treats discount fashion and value retail as serious business subjects, combining on-the-floor observations with analyst commentary about what is and is not working in each format.
The $8 maternity dress the internet can't stop talking about
Hanbury also focuses on moments when specific products become flashpoints for online conversation and brand perception. In her story on the $8 Old Navy maternity dress that the internet cannot stop talking about, she follows how a low-priced, mass-market garment became a viral topic, connecting a simple purchase to wider discussions about image, accessibility, and political context. The piece fits into a broader stream of coverage that tracks viral items, beauty and fashion trends, and deals and promotions, always with attention to how consumer sentiment and social media can drive demand.
Her reporting on AI-fueled new wealth and the luxury status symbols favored by these investors, including high-end watches and bespoke experiences, shows the same interest in how new money chooses to express itself through analog, highly priced goods. She has written on Nike’s challenges in appealing to younger consumers in China, treating brand resonance and cultural relevance as hard business problems that affect sales and market share.
Professional profiles of her work describe a wider remit that includes personal finance, consumer trends, and the retail industry, with an emphasis on beauty and fashion and on how promotions and pricing shape shopper behavior. This mix positions her as someone who can turn a single product, marketing campaign, or online moment into a clear account of what it means for retailers and fashion brands.
EBay listed 6 short reasons it's rejecting Ryan Cohen's takeover offer
Hanbury’s fashion and retail stories sit within a larger portfolio of corporate and market-moving news that gives her coverage of brands a strong financial context.
In her reporting on eBay’s rejection of GameStop CEO Ryan Cohen’s takeover offer, she lays out the six reasons given by the company, translating boardroom decisions into accessible explanations of strategy and risk. Her piece on Coinbase’s memo about layoffs dissects how the company frames “tiny teams,” the removal of “pure managers,” and the role of AI, showing what modern layoff letters reveal about management thinking.
She has covered supply-chain risks during the Omicron wave, warning of a potential “mother of all supply chain stumbles” if factory shutdowns spread across Asia. Earlier work on 24 Hour Fitness closing more than 130 gyms similarly connects corporate restructuring to the impact on customers and physical locations.
She has also reported on leadership changes and investor sentiment at major consumer and retail companies, including new CEOs at Peloton, investigations that delayed Macy’s earnings, and corporate moves at media and telecom firms. This business-side expertise complements her fashion and retail coverage, making her a journalist who can move from a viral dress or off-price store visit to boardroom decisions and market implications with the same direct, grounded tone.
4 more fashion journalists.
Adam Cheung
Adam Cheung is a style writer at British GQ with a specialist focus on sneakers, streetwear and menswear product coverage. He treats sneakers and streetwear as culture and design objects, writing about individual models, new silhouettes and the details that make them stand out. His work spans men’s style, watches and grooming, keeping attention on how people can wear and buy into emerging trends. He produces service-led shopping edits on shoes, bags and accessories, built around clear recommendations and concise reasoning. He covers brands and market trends with an emphasis on wearable takeaways for everyday style and occasion dressing. His British GQ features are republished across international GQ editions, and he runs Typed Hype, an Instazine dedicated to sneaker culture, extending his coverage across mainstream menswear, niche releases and culture-facing commentary.
Alexandra Fullerton
Alexandra Fullerton is a freelance stylist and fashion writer for The Telegraph, known for turning professional styling methods into simple, practical rules for dressing. She covers outfit formulas, wardrobe edits, seasonal dressing, tights, festive knitwear, high-street fashion, smart shopping and investment pieces. Her advice focuses on what to keep, what to buy and how to wear it in real life, rather than fashion news or abstract trends. She draws on a long career as a fashion director and editor at Stylist and Glamour, styling shoots and working with actors, musicians and presenters. She also styles commercial campaigns and individual clients. Fullerton writes fashion books, including guides to everyday dressing and Chanel bags, and runs the My3Words shopping concept based on her three-word method.
Alexandria Dale
Alexandria Dale specialises in turning celebrity style and emerging trends into affordable high street shopping guides. She is Digital Fashion Writer at Cosmopolitan UK, covering fashion news, trend analysis and product-led features. Her beat includes seasonal colours, fabrics, transitional dressing, polished looks on a budget, sustainable fashion and new brands. She finds high street alternatives to luxury pieces and identifies trends worth investing in, with a focus on fit, fabric, versatility and repeat wear. Her guides often centre on one trend or wardrobe staple, with specific buys under a clear price cap. Recent work includes Victoria Beckham-inspired burgundy leather midi skirts, Primark wide-leg trousers, M&S argyle jumpers and Primark home delivery. She has six years of fashion journalism experience across digital and print titles, including Glamour and Ok!, and reports with practical styling advice and product detail.
Alice Reynolds
Alice Reynolds is a writer and production journalist on The Independent’s IndyBest shopping desk who tests accessible supermarket and high-street products in real life. She focuses on fashion, beauty, food and fitness, reviewing supermarket food and drink, protein bars and creatine supplements, and high-street clothing and beauty launches. Her beat spans supermarket staples such as dark chocolate, pizzas, Easter eggs and Greek yoghurt, plus workout snacks and performance supplements, and value-led fashion like viral jackets, wrap skirts and beauty advent calendars. She runs comparative “best of” round-ups that weigh flavour, texture, thickness, quality, price and usefulness, using hands-on trials and taste tests. Her reporting is plain, practical and grounded in repeated supermarket and high-street testing, informed by interests in food, fitness and lifestyle shopping and earlier experience across travel and news formats.