By Jon Robinson
Matalan’s pre-tax loss was slashed during its latest financial year despite its sale dipping, according to new figures.
The Liverpool-headquartered company has posted a loss of £60m for the year to February 24, 2024, compared to a loss of £106m in the prior 12 months.
The results also show Matalan’s revenue declined from £1.1bn to £1bn over the same period.
The results are the first since Matalan was taken over by its lenders in January 2023 in a move which ended the involvement of founder John Hargreaves.
The group, led by Invesco, Man GLG, Napier Park and Tresidor, sealed the deal after Matalan launched a sales process in September 2022.
The move saw the lenders cut the group’s gross debt by £257m to £336m and agreed up to £100m in new growth funding as part of the deal.
‘Still in the early days of our transformation’
Chief executive Jo Whitfield said: “In the last year we have kick started the transformation of Matalan against a very challenging backdrop, resetting the foundations of the business.
“We delivered a significant increase in underlying profit as a result of our clear focus on growing full price sales and tight cost control.
“With a new leadership team in place, we have put the customer back at the heart of Matalan to make sure we become top of their list of go-to value retailers.
“We have reset our value proposition, acted decisively to improve and strengthen our online performance and worked to improve our in-store execution.
“Looking ahead, we are determined to deliver better value, more choice and improved style for all our customers.
“It is still early days in our transformation, and while we have much more to do, with challenges ahead, we are pleased that the actions we have already taken are having an impact as we build a stronger, more modern Matalan.”
