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(Alliance News) - Superdry PLC on Monday posted a drop in annual revenue and a deeper loss as it expressed concern about economic recovery and the resultant impact to its turnaround plan.
Shares in the clothing retailer were trading 11% lower at 135.00 pence each on Monday morning in London.
For the 52 weeks ended April 25, Superdry posted a pretax loss of GBP166.9 million, widened significantly from GBP89.3 million the year prior. This was as revenue fell 19% to GBP704.4 million from GBP871.7 million.
The fall in sales reflected a planned move away from "persistent discounting", and also the hit from Covid-19 in the fourth quarter, with Superdry's entire store estate closed from March 22 to the financial year-end.
No final dividend was declared, compared to 2.2p the year prior. As a result, the full year payout was 2.0p, down significantly from 11.5p paid for financial 2019.
Turning to current trading, the Gloucestershire-based retailer said it continues to see disruption but highlighted an improvement from the end of the financial year. It noted that 95% of its store estate and 98% of franchises now have re-opened since lockdown.
"While our underlying profit has been impacted by trading performance during the year, including Covid-19 related store closures, I am particularly pleased by how strongly e-commerce has performed, with FY21 first quarter revenues nearly doubling year-on-year," said Julian Dunkerton, founder & chief executive.
Superdry said it still expects full-year store sales to be hurt, but noted it expects its wholesale business to improve from current levels while e-commerce is set to benefit from the continued channel shift arising from social distancing measures in stores.
"The Covid-19 pandemic has created unprecedented levels of uncertainty including, but not limited to the recovery in consumer demand and the impacts of social distancing measures, levels of competitive discounting, supply chain disruption, and geopolitical impacts. From a strategic perspective the company will continue to focus on design, product, consumer targeting and highly efficient operations, to ensure that it maximises performance where possible to drive the brand turnaround, grow scale and return the brand to sustainable, profitable growth, Superdry said.
"Despite a stronger than anticipated performance in the first quarter, historically our lowest trading period, we remain cautious on the shape of the economic recovery, and the impact this may have on our ability to turnaround performance," it added.
Net cash as at year-end was GBP36.7 million, up 2.2% from GBP35.9 million.
By Ife Taiwo; ifetaiwo@alliancenews.com
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