Debenhams warns on profit after price cuts fail to lure shoppers

Department store operator Debenhams slashed its annual profit forecast on Thursday after it was forced to cut prices to drive Christmas gift sales, hammering its shares and putting the stock on track for its worst ever daily fall.

The downturn at the 240-year-old group illustrates the struggle traditional retailers face against online competition, a decline in demand for clothing and pressure on consumer spending.

Debenhams said its underlying British sales fell 2.6 per cent in the 17 weeks to December 30th, reflecting a “volatile and competitive market” in the months before Christmas and a disappointing first week of its sale after December 25th.

However, it did note that Debenhams in the Republic of Ireland delivered "positive like-for-like growth in constant currency" against a backdrop where "other markets remain mixed".

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Shares fell 20 per cent and weighed on fellow retailers such as Marks & Spencer, just a day after an upbeat statement from Next raised hopes that retailers had defied forecasts for gloomy Christmas trading.

"The market has been challenging and particularly promotional in some of our key seasonal categories and we have responded in order to remain competitive for our customers, which has impacted our profit performance," Debenhams chief executive Sergio Bucher said.

Transformation programme

Debenhams, Britain’s second-biggest department store operator which trades from more than 240 stores across 27 countries, is in the midst of a transformation programme to close some stores and revamp the others.

It said it managed to increase like-for-like sales by 1.2 per cent in the six weeks to Christmas after it cut the price of gifts. With shoppers failing to return to the stores after Christmas, it cut prices again, at a heavy cost to its margins. It said its gross margin for the first half would now be down by about 150 basis points, far below its target of a 25 basis point fall for the year to September 2018. It said its profit before tax for the year was now likely to be in the range of £55 million to £65 million.

Debenhams reported underlying profit before tax of £95 million last year and analysts had been expecting a figure of £83 million pounds in 2018, according to Reuters data.

Analysts at Liberum, who have a “sell” rating on the stock, said the lower margin would have a £35 million impact on gross profit, offset only partly by £10 million of additional cost savings.

They cut their profit target by 35 per cent to £52.1 million.

– Reuters