Member Article

Wakefield’s Card Factory completes £200 million refinancing

Card Factory, the Wakefield retailer of greeting cards has confirmed that it has completed the refinancing of its existing senior bank facilities, after declaring itsIPO in April.

As set out in the new senior bank facilities (used in part for the refinancing) include a £180 million term loan facility and a £20 million revolving facility (both with a 5 year maturity).

The applicable margin is subject to an EBITDA leverage ratchet. The initial applicable margin is 2.00% on the term loan facility and 1.75% on the revolving facility resulting in a significant reduction in the interest payable when compared to the previous higher margins under the existing senior bank facilities.

As previously announced, taking into account the IPO proceeds and transaction costs, the Group had net debt on 20 May 2014, the date that the Company’s shares were admitted to listing, of approximately £160 million, representing approximately 2.0x underlying EBITDA for the year ended 31 January 2014.

Card Factory sold over 285 million single cards in the financial year ended 31 January 2014. In that year, the Group achieved revenue growth of 9.0% to £326.9 million and underlying EBITDA growth of 9.2% to £80.4 million (2013: £73.6 million) at a margin of 24.6%.

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