Retail sales at apparel and homewares retailer/cataloguer
Next were down 3.9 per cent in the first quarter,
while its Directory arm saw a growth of 11.8 per cent. Thanks to
the performance in its eCommerce and mail order division, total
Next brand sales were up 1.4 per cent in the 13 weeks to 28th
April.
At Home Retail Group, the parent company of
Argos and Homebase, sales
declined 6 per cent to £5.49 billion in the last financial
year. Benchmark operating profit slumped 61 per cent to £98
million and the company confirmed it will not be paying
shareholders a final dividend this year. Breaking the figures
down further, Argos suffered a 7.7 per cent sales decline during
the year to £3.87 billion. To develop its multichannel
capabilities, Argos has announced it will launch new apps for
tablet devices and revamp its eCommerce website in time for
Christmas 2012.
Total revenue at cosmetics marketer Avon dipped
2 per cent to $2.6 billion in the first quarter of the year, with
gross margin down 310 basis points on the same quarter last year.
Avon blamed cost pressures, such as the price of commodities and
labour, as well as the negative impact from foreign exchange and
product mix. New chief executive Sheri McCoy is now leading a
restructuring process to reduce costs and improve efficiencies.
Speculation is rife that Julia Reynolds is planning to leave
Blacks Leisure Group where she is currently
chief executive. The Independent has more on the story.
Data analytics firm Teradata and its subsidiary
Aprimo are to acquire Munich-based
eCircle, a cloud-based provider of digital
marketing services.
Stamp specialist Stanley Gibbons has launched
its Gibbons Stamp Monthly magazine as an iPhone and iPad app. A
second app, also on the Apple platform, is due to launch later
this month, with the aim of providing collectors easier and
greater access to the company’s inventory including access to
auction and product brochures from Stanley Gibbons
companies.
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