House of Fraser has reported growing losses as well as a decline in like-for-like sales for the 26 weeks to July 29th. Even online sales had fallen 9.8 per cent due to disruption caused by the re-platforming of the retailers website, and the restructuring of its online team which had resulted in ten job losses. Elsewhere the business had worked to cull some of its house brands which necessitated discounting to clear old stock.
New CEO Alex Williamson remains bullish, despite declaring an EBITDA loss of £8.6 million on sales of £545.8 million for the period, saying that the eCommerce division is now performing well and that HoF’s £18 million investment in its distribution centre has increased capacity, and that the transformation achieved was only the start of overall improvement with many new projects in the pipeline.
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