Member Article

Rotherham’s United Carpets reports "unexpected" growth

Rotherham-based United Carpets, the specialist retail carpet and floor covering store, has announce that trading in the second half of the current financial year, has been better than expected, up 5.4%.

On a like for like basis, sales for the 21 weeks of second half to date are up 5.4% against the comparable period last year.

The trading improvement “should be viewed in the context of a weaker trading period last year which was affected by heavy snowfall.”

United Carpets is the UK’s second largest chain of carpet and flooring retailers.

During 2012, the Group had a major restructuring, closing a significant proportion of its store base to create a smaller entity.

The restructuring was implemented over the latter half of 2012 and during 2013 and, this has resulted in a reduction in the number of stores from 85 to 59 today of which 48 are franchised and 11 are corporate stores.

The firm also believes there has been a “slight improvement” in confidence amongst consumers,although they described the overall market as “remaining very challenging.”

Consequently, the Board now expect its final results for the year ended 31 March 2014 to be materially better than market expectations.

Paul Eyre, Chief Executive, said: “We have been encouraged with trading in the early part of this calendar year which will flow through to better than expected year end numbers.

“The changes we have made have transformed our business and with the economy as a whole appearing to move in the right direction, I am increasingly optimistic about the future.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Clare Burnett .