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Mothercare has reported a 2.8 per cent decline in UK like-for-like sales for the 12 weeks until 24 March, compared to the same period in the previous year.
David Wood, Chief Executive Officer of Mothercare plc, said: “Our overall Group performance for FY18 was in line with previous guidance for both adjusted Group profit and net debt.
“The UK retail trading environment remained relatively muted in the quarter, with a continuing trend of lower footfall in stores, though there was an encouraging return to growth online, with website sales in particular growing at 7.2 per cent. In this competitive climate, promotional activity has been necessary to stimulate customer demand.
“International retail sales were down overall 3.7 per cent, impacted by lower market footfall and the timing of promotional activity in Russia. The return to growth in the Middle East that we observed in Q3 has continued throughout this period, which is encouraging.
“My immediate priority is to ensure Mothercare is put back on a sound financial footing and to improve its financial performance. We continue to make good progress in reducing the size of our UK store estate in response to changing consumer preferences and in reducing our central cost base, but our central focus must be customers and their experience, securing Mothercare’s reputation as the number one specialist for parents.
“We remain in constructive dialogue with our financing partners with respect to our financing needs for FY19 and beyond, and we continue to explore additional sources of financing to support and maintain the momentum of our transformation programme. All of these discussions are on-going and further updates will be given as appropriate.”
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