Revenues at Irish department store retailer Brown Thomas Arnotts rose by 6 per cent last year to a record €337.3 million but it was dragged into the red by non-cash finance and tax charges relating to a sale-and-leaseback property transaction.
Latest accounts for Brown Thomas Arnotts Ltd show it made an operating profit of €7.6 million in the year to the end of February 3rd, 2024. This was up on the €6.3 million figure of a year earlier.
However, a non-cash finance charge of €31.8 million relating to the reversal of a sale-and-leaseback transaction involving the group’s properties that took place the previous year, and a non-cash reversal of a deferred tax asset, created by the same property deal, resulted in the company recording a bottom line loss of €36.9 million.
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These are non-recurring events with the result that the company’s accounts for the period to the end of December 2024 – it is changing its financial year end date – will be normalised around its trading activities.
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Brown Thomas Arnotts chief executive Donald McDonald said each of its stores – it has outlets in Dublin, Cork, Limerick and Galway – reported higher revenue last year with the exception of Arnotts, which was impacted by the Dublin riots last November. “We were about 1 per cent down [in Arnotts] on the year and that was to do with the loss of revenue due to the riots.”
When asked if Arnotts had bounced back from the impact of the riots, Mr McDonald said “bounce back might be too strong a terminology but it is ahead of last year”. Irish bookseller Eason recently opened a shop in Arnotts while Cork furniture group Caseys opened this week. In addition, 53 Degrees North is due to unveil a 5,000sq ft unit there this month, and a new cafe is to open in the coming weeks, he added.
Overall, Mr McDonald said the group was trading about 35 per cent ahead of where it was before the Covid-19 pandemic hit in March 2020. That includes its Dundrum store, opened in 2022, and a spike in digital sales.
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He said gross revenue from digital this year would be “just short” of €100 million, roughly triple the size before the pandemic. Online sales are up 15 per cent this year, having risen by 18 per cent last year, he added.
Mr McDonald said the group would invest €50 million over the next five years in upgrading its stores and digital platform. “We will have a significant expansion of the luxury offering here [Brown Thomas on Grafton Street] next year,” he said.
“We are planning to double the size of the Chanel boutique. Arnotts will see a major reconfiguration, doubling the size of the Planet Beauty offering in the next six weeks and we have a longer-term plan, too. We also have significant plans for Cork and almost every store has an investment plan for the next 12-18 months. And we’ve just invested in our warehouse management system. We’re confident on the outlook.”
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On current trading, he said: “This year is quite good, we’re up 3 or 4 per cent on last year.”
Brown Thomas Arnotts was acquired by Cambridge Retail Group Holding Ltd in August 2022. Thai conglomerate Central Group owns 60 per cent of the business with Signa Retail in Austria owning the balance.
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