Card Factory eyes market share growth as store roll-outs continue

CARD Factory, which recently made its debut on the London Stock Exchange valued at £766m, said this morning it is continuing to grow its market share with a “strong pipeline” of new store opportunities.

In a trading update for the six months to July, the company which was founded in Wakefield, said it continues to trade in line with expectations, growing like-for-like sales and expanding its retail estate through its established new store roll out programme.

In the period, total group sales grew by 8.9% and 36 new stores were opened, bringing the total estate to 749 stores.

“The group has a strong pipeline of additional new store opportunities and remains confident of achieving planned openings of approximately 50 net new stores in the current financial year, in line with the historic opening rate,” Card Factory said.

Chief executive Richard Hayes said: “The group continued to trade well in the first half of the current financial year with good growth coming from the existing store estate and new store roll out programme, as well as from our smaller but developing online proposition.

“We remain confident of the group’s ability to continue to grow market share for the foreseeable future and look forward to updating investors further in September.”

The group will announce its interim results for the six months ended July 31 on September 18.