Member Article

Food boosts difficult period for Marks and Spencer

Marks and Spencer’s food businesses has enjoyed a strong first quarter of 2013, boosting like-for-like UK food sales by 0.3%.

The high street retailers clothing business and general merchandise category had suffered due to intense promotional activity from competitors, and a difficult trading period.

Despite some gains in its online business, the retailer says it remains cautious about the outlook and will continue to manage business “tightly.”

Chief executive, Mark Bolland, said: “Our General Merchandise business showed some improvement this quarter and the Food business delivered another excellent performance, continuing the strong underlying trend.

“Our International business also performed well during the quarter and M&S.com sales were very strong.

“We continue to make good progress with our plans to transform M&S into an international, multi-channel retailer.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Tom Keighley .