From pants to panettone

By CR

THE past year has been rough on Britain’s retailers. Undercut on price by Aldi and Lidl, a pair of German discounters, three of Britain’s biggest four supermarkets have reported losses. Tesco, the largest, last month revealed a stonking shortfall of £6.4 billion ($9.6 billion). Clothing retailers, facing competition from online firms with lower overheads, have not fared much better. In March BHS, a loss-making high-street chain with 171 stores, was sold to a group of venture capitalists for just £1. But a glimmer of hope for the sector has come from an unexpected source: the long-struggling Marks & Spencer.

On May 20th the food and clothes retailer announced a 6.1% increase in profits, to £661m, in the year to March, the first year-on-year increase since 2011. That came on top of better-than-expected sales figures. In the first three months of this year M&S’s general merchandise (that is, clothing and homeware) revenues rose for the first time in 14 quarters, following a bounce in online sales. Marc Bolland, the chief executive, was keen to show that his turnaround strategy was working. But even he admitted that the firm’s only “outstanding” performance was in its food division.