Marks & Spencer 13-week Christmas trading sales rise, confident for rest of year

Retail major Marks and Spencer Group Plc reported Thursday that its 13-week Group sales during Christmas trading increased 5.6 percent from last year to 4.06 billion pounds with growth in UK and ROI region.

Looking ahead, the company said it is confident of making further progress in the remainder of the year.

In its Christmas trading update, the company said total UK and ROI sales grew 5.9 percent year-over-year to 3.89 billion pounds, with 8.7 percent growth in Food sales and 1 percent rise in Clothing, Home & Beauty sales.

Like-for-like sales for the UK and ROI region grew 6.4 percent, while the growth was 8.9 percent in Food sales, and 1.9 percent in Clothing, Home & Beauty sales, ahead of the market in challenging conditions.

M&S sustained UK volume growth of 6.6 percent from the first half into the Christmas trading period driven by increased customers and transactions.

Meanwhile, international sales dropped 2.8 percent from last year to 178 million pounds in the 13 weeks mainly due to continued challenging market conditions in India and the phasing of franchise shipments.

Stuart Machin, chief executive said: "This was another good Christmas for M&S, building on a strong performance in the prior year. .. Sales records were broken across the business, with Food recording its biggest day and Clothing, Home & Beauty online its biggest week, but we're not complacent - as a growth business it's our job to break records."(DPA)