Manchester based N Brown, the parent company of fashion retailers JD Williams and Jacamo has announced a new partnership with Tesco as it reveals a fall in annual profits this morning.
The group announced that its adjusted profit before tax dropped by 8.7 per cent to £80.6 million in the year to March 4 while thanks to miscalculating compensation owed to customers, following complaints about its financial services earlier this year, it recorded exceptional costs of £25.2 million,
With its store estate recording an operating loss of £2 million, N Brown said there were no plans to open any new stores in the future.
However, N Brown’s overall revenue went up 2.5 per cent to £887.7 million, with product revenue up 3.4 per cent and financial services revenue edging up by 0.4 per cent.
Online revenues were also on the up in the twelve months with an increase of 10 per cent , with 71 per cent of traffic coming from mobile devices.
The company also revealed a new partnership with Tesco, where N Brown will sell a capsule collection of Simply Be and Jacamo lines on Tesco Direct and in some stores in Hungary, Slovakia, Poland and the Czech Republic.
”Tesco Direct is one of the UK’s largest ecommerce sites, and this partnership will be an excellent way of further increasing awareness of our unique offer in an under-served market,” N Brown chief executive Angela Spindler said.
She added that “The macro-economic backdrop remains challenging for retail. Against this backdrop we remain vigilant over our core costs and efficiencies. We are also continuing to invest in improving our capabilities and customer experience to enable future profitable growth.”
