N Brown H1 revenue down as retailer faces a "transitional year"

16th Sep 2014 10:54

The fashion retailer N Brown Group said on Tuesday that sales were down in the first half as it faces a “transitional year”.The home-shopping group, which operates online and through catalogues, said revenues decreased by 0.6% in the first six months of the year. In like-for-like basis revenues dropped by 0.5%.N Brown said the home and gifts department suffered a 9% decrease on sales, while planned phasing adjustments in the Simply Be & JD Williams, the company’s core fashion ranges, also impacted sales during the period.JD Williams faced a re-branding during the first half in order to attract new customers to mature female fashion, which represents the biggest segment in N Brown’s business.Catalogues circulation was reduced by 24% in order to cut spending.Chief executive Angela Spindler said: “The combined effect of changes to our category focus, the planned reduction in credit sales from high risk areas and the reduction and re-phasing of our mailing programme has reduced revenues in the half, however we have improved the quality and profitability of our sales.”Shore Capital analysts said the results represent “confirmation of what has been another quite mellow trading period for the group".Meanwhile, Investec's Kate Calvert said the update was “worse than expectations”, but gave a ‘buy’ rating to the group as she expects sales to accelerate during the second half.Shares at N Brown were down 4.86% to 385.3p on Tuesday at 12:05.