Boux Avenue enjoys strong Christmas, makes turnaround progress in latest year

By

Nigel TAYLOR

Published
Jan 6, 2022

Theo Paphitis Retail Group, which owns lingerie chain Boux Avenue (as well as household and hardware goods retailer Robert Dyas, and stationer Ryman), saw sales rising 15.6% in the six weeks to December 24 compared to two years ago.

The company was helped by an online boom with e-sales up as much as 87.5%, although store sales fell 6.3%.

But the business also said the year to March 20201 saw all three operations falling to EBITDA losses, although the firm’s owner, retail tycoon Theo Paphitis, was pleased with how they navigated the height of the pandemic.

Boux Avenue saw sales growth of 9.1% in the year (helped by almost 130% growth online) with the firm making progress after a strategic review in 2019. The company didn’t give any monetary figures for Boux’s sales.

The chain was boosted as it launched a number of key campaigns during the period linked to body positivity and sport, as well as an online bra fit tool. And after the year ended, it also added its first athleisure line and debuted dresses.

Despite the sales rise, it remained loss-making on an underlying EBITDA basis, although that loss narrowed to £3.5 million from £14.9 million. And Paphitis said the performance has continued to improved in the current financial year on both the sales and profits front.

Paphitis also called for the Government to urgently address the issue of the business rate load on retailers. He said: “The strength of our e-commerce trading masks the much more challenging store environment, in particular in city centres and prime locations, where business rates are unfairly high. It is therefore a major disappointment that this has failed to be structurally addressed by the chancellor.”