John Lewis festive fashion sales improve 4.9 percent

Gross sales at the John Lewis Partnership were up 2.5 percent versus last year to 1,962 million pounds (2,644 million dollars) over the six weeks ending December 30, 2017. The company said, John Lewis significantly outperformed the market again this year, building on last year’s strong peak trading performance despite the challenging, highly promotional trading environment. The company said, across the three product areas there was a particularly good performance in fashion up 4.9 percent, and EHT up 5 percent while home was down 0.3 percent.

Commenting on the Christmas trading update, Sir Charlie Mayfield, Chairman of the John Lewis Partnership, said in a press release: “We traded well during the Christmas period, with gross sales in the six weeks to December 30, up 2.5 percent on last year, with 1.4 percent sales growth in Waitrose and 3.6 percent in John Lewis. The pressure on margin seen in the first half of the year has intensified because of our choice to maintain competitive prices, despite higher costs mainly due to the weaker exchange rate. This will negatively affect full-year financial results as indicated previously. Looking ahead to 2018/19 we expect trading to be volatile due to the economic environment.”

During Christmas, the company offered customers popular shop experiences including my John Lewis customer Christmas events which saw a 15 percent increase in attendance and an 18 percent uplift in sales compared to last year. The Black Friday week, John Lewis said, was the busiest in its history and included a record hour for online trade.

Picture:John Lewis website