Comet posts robust festive sales

Comet parent Kesa revealed a like-for-like drop of 5.5 per cent in the 10 weeks to January 8 and it expects the tough trading conditions to continue.

Total sales in local currency slid 2.2 per cent. Comet’s total sales fell 0.4 per cent.

Kesa said market conditions in the UK remained “very aggressive”, leading to a decline in gross margin of approximately 170 basis points compared to last year.

Kesa's French fascia Darty recorded a like for like sales decrease of 6.2 per cent while total sales slipped 3.6 per cent. Gross margin remained “stable”.

Chief executive Jean-Noel Labroue said: “As anticipated, the trading conditions across all our markets for our important peak period were very tough with further deterioration in Continental Europe. In the UK, Comet delivered a particularly strong post-Christmas sales performance and overall our businesses continued to make good progress in stock and cash management.

"We are expecting the difficult economic environment to continue and we will remain particularly focussed on maintaining our strong balance sheet including net cash at the end of April."

The retailer said the group like-for-like sales decline was in line with the first half of the financial year, and that November and December “remained weak with an improvement post Christmas, particularly in the UK”.

At its other businesses, based across Continental Europe and including Vanden Borre and Datart, like for likes declined 9.2 per cent, with total sales dropping 2.1 per cent.

In a statement, Kesa blamed a “further deterioration in market conditions”, although said its established businesses, such as BCC, “continued to outperform their markets”.

It said its start-up businesses in Italy, Switzerland and Turkey improved their overall position, but said Spain is still experiencing the worst trading conditions.

Overall group online-generated sales continued to show “good growth”.