Kesa braced for Comet loss

Comet parent company Kesa Electricals today warned of a full-year loss for its UK operation after festive sales plunged 7.3%.

Kesa blamed strong competition and the extreme weather for its like-for-like sales disappointment between November 1 and January 18.

It said record trading since Christmas failed to offset last month’s woes, while the VAT hike on January 4 caused the new year recovery to soften.

Kesa now expects to report a small full-year retail loss for Comet and cautioned overall group profits for the period to April 30 were set to come in at the lower end of market forecasts.

The poor performance in the UK was mirrored in Kesa’s Italian, Turkish and Spanish operations, where it trades as Darty.

These markets saw like-for-like sales drop 8.8%, leaving group sales down 4% despite more resilient trading at Darty France.

The pre-Christmas snowfall in Britain, together with adverse weather in France, the Netherlands and Belgium during its key trading period knocked at least 2% off sales, said Kesa.