Kingfisher reports decline in sales and profits

Kingfisher has posted a decline in sales and profits after a disappointing performance at B&Q and poor sales in France.

In the six months leading to July 31^st, like-for-like sales were down by 1.8%.  Underlying pre-tax profit fell by 6.4% to £353.3 million.

Veronique Laury, Kingfisher chief executive, said: “Our transformation activity continued in the first half of this year, including new range launches across the group and the rollout of further capabilities within our unified IT platform. These activities resulted in some ongoing disruption that impacted sales at B&Q and Castorama France. This was partly offset by positive sales performances in Screwfix, which continues to grow its market share, and Poland.”

The group’s UK retail profits dropped by 1.7% to £277 million.  Like-for-like sales at B&Q fell by 3.2% as trading was impacted by the discontinuation of the retailers installation services and on going work to introduce new surfaces and décor ranges.  Screwfix like-for-like sales climbed by 5.1%.