Blacks Leisure performing "satisfactorily"
15 July 2009 09:57
Blacks Leisure Group has said that the company is performing "satisfactorily" and is in negotiations concerning the renewal of its existing working capital facility with Lloyds bank.
In a statement ahead of its annual general meeting to be held later today, Blacks said: "After 19 weeks of the new financial year the business is performing satisfactorily, with like for like sales for the group down 1.8%. Within this total, outdoor is down 1.6% and boardwear is down 3.2%.
"The relative improvement in the boardwear performance partly reflects the conversion of seven boardwear stores to the outdoor format earlier in the year.
"The new format outdoor stores, which are an important element of the recovery strategy for the business, continued to perform well, reporting sales growth of 10.4% above the fascia average".
The company's outdoor division currently trades from 256 Millets stores and 116 Blacks Outdoor stores.
In boardwear, Freespirit operates from 31 stores and O'Neill from 12 stores.
Concerning negotiations with its bankers, the board said that it had confidence the process would be completed rapidly, "to enable the group to focus on the continued delivery of the business turnaround plan".
In addition, the company said that Claude Littner and Andrew Mallett have decided to step down as non-executive directors with immediate effect to enable them to spend more time on their other business commitments.
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