Sales climb at homewares giant as online strategy pays off

Portmeirion Group, the Stoke-based designer, manufacturer and worldwide distributor of homewares under the Portmeirion, Spode, Royal Worcester, Pimpernel, Wax Lyrical and Nambé brands, has seen revenues climb in the first six months of its financial year.

Sales for the first half of the year will be around £43m (2020: £32m) – an increase of 34%. The firm says it has seen growth across its three biggest geographical markets of the UK, USA and South Korea compared to H1 2020, and also continues to see strong sales growth in online channels in its major markets.

Mike Raybould, chief executive, said: “We have continued to trade strongly in May and June and it is particularly pleasing to see that we are achieving like-for-like sales growth over pre Covid-19 trading levels, despite continuing disruption in our markets due to the UK’s lockdown in Q1 2021 and ongoing Covid-19 related global shipping and supply chain delays. This performance demonstrates the strategic progress we are making as a business, including our online and digital transformation and rest of world sales growth.

“We have a strong global order book going into our important second half trading period. Whilst we remain cognisant of the ongoing supply chain-related challenges, we remain confident of the trading outlook for the rest of FY21.”