Home Fashion Ted Baker's fashion chain shows 13% jump in sales

Ted Baker's fashion chain shows 13% jump in sales

TED Baker, the global fashion label with its roots in Scotland, has reported a 13 per cent jump in retail sales despite a tough trading environment. As well as benefiting from an increase in trading space, the group said its strong spring and summer collections and "meticulous focus" on quality and attention to detail had continued to underpin growth. However, the update - covering the 19 weeks to last Saturday - also revealed that sales at the wholesale business had fallen 6.7 per cent year-on-year. Overall, the group's revenues were up 6.4 per cent over the period. Finance director Lindsay Page said the firm, which started out as a single specialist shirt outlet in Glasgow in the late 1980s, was on track to reach full-year profit forecasts of between £21.7 million and £22.5m. Analysts kept forecasts unchanged, with Richard Ratner of Seymour Pierce looking for full-year profits of about £21.9m, up from £20m a year ago. "Ted Baker is an excellently managed niche business in an area that we favour," Ratner said. "The market may not like the fall-off in wholesale, a combination of some of its customers struggling generally and a deliberate culling of some accounts, but the company did warn at the time of the annual results that it expected wholesale to be slightly down." The stock, which Ratner rates as an "outperform", dipped 1.5p to 571p, valuing the group at about £240m. Page said that, with retail expected to continue to outperform wholesale, the group's profits would be weighted towards its second half, which includes Christmas trading and is the stronger period for its high street operation. Wholesale customers are to be more closely monitored. "Some of our wholesale customers are not having such a good time on the high street, and so they are ordering less," Page said. "One or two of them are not doing a great job, and perhaps they are no longer appropriate for Ted Baker, and it may be that we decide not to supply them any longer." While the UK remains Ted Baker's core market, it has also invested in global expansion over the past year, particularly in Asia and the Middle East. In recent months, licensed stores have opened at locations including Dubai, Singapore, Bangkok, Jakarta and Hong Kong. The group plans to open outlets in Brighton and Dublin in the second half and continue its expansion in Asia. Founder and chief executive Ray Kelvin said: "While the results for the full year will, as always, be dependent on trading in the second half of the financial year, the board remains confident of another successful outcome for the year." Source : Scotsman, UK

 

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