Superdry continues to underperform, issues profit warning

After exiting the London Stock Exchange in July as part of its restructuring plan, Superdry Group revenue for the year to April 27, 2024 of 488.6 million pounds decreased by 22 percent. The company attributed the decline to continued underperformance of the wholesale business and softer performance of the retail segment.

For the year ahead, Superdry expects profitability to be impacted by weaker trading.

On a medium to long-term view, recognising that there is a complex pathway in the interim to navigate, the company expects to achieve revenue of between 350 million to 400 million pounds, gross margin slightly ahead of current levels and mid to high single digits EBITDA margin.

Superdry said in a filing with the Companies House that wholesale was down 36 percent to 117 million pounds reflecting underperformance of the channel and challenges faced by the company trying to restructure the business to deliver growth.

The retail segment declined by 16 percent to 371.6 million pounds due to declining store and ecommerce sales. Ecommerce was down 18 percent to 146 million pounds impacted by the external and macro-economic factors and profit focused reduction in spend on digital marketing. Stores were down 14 percent to 225.6 million pounds with sales impacted by unseasonal weather and timing of promotions.

“Notwithstanding the softer sales performance, a significant success of the period has been the steps taken to reduce costs. The directors and wider management team placed emphasis on the delivery of our cost efficiency program with in access of 40 million pounds savings realised within the year,” Superdry said.

Gross margin for the period improved 2.2 percentage points to 55 percent, while the adjusted loss before tax widened to 48.3 million pounds and statutory loss before tax was 67.7 million pounds.