Card Factory
Image Source: bob walker
Card Factory has seen online sales increase by 302 per cent since the beginning of lockdown.

Card Factory increases online sales 302% ahead of store reopenings

A UK greeting card company has seen online sales increase by 302 per cent since the beginning of lockdown.

Card Factory, which is headquartered in Wakefield, also said that it plans to reopen 10 per cent of its stores from mid-June.

The company reported an 11.8 per cent drop in underlying pre-tax profits for the last financial year, which it said was largely due to the cost of the increase of the national living wage.

During lockdown, Card Factory has furloughed more than 90 per cent of its staff, and has cancelled its dividend payouts for this year.

Karen Hubbard, CEO of Card Factory, commented: “We delivered a reasonable sales performance in a challenging year for the high street, growing both our volume and value card market share in the mature and stable UK greeting card market.

“Our profitability was, however, impacted by a number of recurring cost pressures and other one off operational costs which we were not able to fully mitigate.

“Across the year we also developed a refreshed long term strategy for future profitable growth.

“The strategy is focused on strengthening both our market position and the financial performance of the UK business.

“During the second half of the year we tested our price positioning and elasticity, trailed new customer propositions, and developed partnerships to grow our UK market share through concessions and supply arrangements.

“These partnerships have enabled us to serve card shoppers when they are on impulse-driven purchases away from our own retail stores.

“We have developed further our online infrastructure and capability to ensure that we are set to deliver in what is increasingly becoming a multi-channel environment.

“We believe there is an opportunity to leverage our current infrastructure and supply chain and build market share in other card markets across the world under the Card Factory brand.

“Since the year end, whilst we have continued to evolve our medium and longer term plans, a key focus has been on appropriately managing our business and protecting our staff through the COVID-19 crisis.

“We have developed flexible plans which will ensure the safety of our colleagues and customers whilst allowing a phased re-opening of our stores from the 15 June in line with government guidelines.”

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