Dutch high street retail chain Hema is trying to persuade its landlords to cut rents to offset falling sales, the Volkskrant says on Thursday.

Department store V&D is currently in the middle of trying to engineer rent cuts at its 63 shops nationwide and has demanded an across-the-board reduction.

By contrast, Hema says such talks are ‘an every day part of doing business’ and there is ‘nothing odd about them’, the paper reports.

‘We started this series of talks on behalf of Hema at the end of 2013,’ according to Joop van der Steuijt, founder of company Retail Property Management which is one of the companies negotiating for Hema.

‘Retailers are increasingly aware that their sales in the physical shops are under pressure while rents remain unchanged. We want to do something about this distorted relationship,’ he said.

Van der Steuijt is also in negotiations with landlords on behalf of D-RT Group, which operates a number of travel agents including D-Reizen and Thomas Cook. Retail Property Management has also been in talks on behalf of Douglas, C&A, H&M, Scapino, Prénatal and Witteveen, the Volkskrant says.

On Thursday, a court ordered V&D to continue paying the full rent for its department store in Hengelo. The building’s owners have refused to sign up to the rescue plan agreed by most of V&D’s landlords. The debt is said to be around €150,000.