In The Style making progress in strategic plans, trading update shows
Digital women’s fashion brand In The Style Group issued a positive trading update Friday ahead of its AGM, having made “significant progress” against several of its strategic priorities, “to increase profitability”.
The “disruptive and inclusive” retailer said these strategic priorities support its on-going focus on re-engineering its business model “to increase profitability and manage the cash position”. It noted net cash currently stands at £4.3 million, following investment and exceptional items.
That progress has included moving to a new, larger, fully operational 84,000 sq ft. warehouse at the end of August. Expected efficiencies gained through the move “provide benefits to the group’s distribution costs per unit whilst providing sufficient capacity for future growth”.
The retailer also launched ‘Fits’, a collection of own-brand wardrobe staples, noting the level of gross order value generated on the day of launch “was one of the largest of the year so far” enabling it to increase sales outside of the group’s traditional influencer campaign launch cycle.
It also said “good progress” has been made in optimising stock buys, in line with the strategic focus on increasing the proportion of full-price sales. It’s expected that these ‘buy quantity’ reductions will benefit the level of gross margin generated by the group from October 2022.
The company completed a restructuring of its marketing, technology and product departments as well, “to increase operating efficiencies from October”.
Sam Perkins, CEO of In The Style, said: “We have made solid progress against the Group’s refined long-term growth strategy outlined at our FY22 results in July.
“As has been widely reported, the trading environment is a challenging one for both consumers and retailers. The launch model and our position as a pureplay online retailer allows us to respond quickly to changing consumer behaviour, whilst not losing sight of achieving In The Style’s long-term potential as one of the UK’s most exciting fashion brands.”
In that July statement, ITS
During the April-June first quarter, year-on-year revenue in its direct-to-consumer channel rose 12%, customer KPIs continued to improve, and return rates were in line with expectations.
