Retail giant Pets at Home experienced a challenging period in the run up to Christmas with particularly weak footfall from October.

The group’s trading statement this week revealed revenues had fallen in what’s described as the ‘golden quarter’ because the difficult financial environment led to fewer customers visiting stores. 

In the three months to 2 January, retail revenue fell by 2.4% and by 2.8% on a like-for-like basis.

The company stated: “As widely reported across the consumer sector, Q3 saw a more challenging UK consumer backdrop with particularly weak footfall from October. At the same time, our digital performance improved, building momentum through the quarter, with continued strong growth in subscriptions.”

In contrast, vet group revenue growth was strong at 21.3% with a like-for-like uplift of 19.9% with the group revealing: “High quality growth continued with Practices seeing double digit revenue growth supported by growth in subscriptions, visits, and average transaction values.”

The trading statement added:

“Full year underlying PBT guidance is unchanged. We are on track to deliver modest growth in underlying PBT this year as set out at our H1 results. Against a still subdued consumer backdrop, we have maintained a disciplined gross margin performance, supported by strong Christmas seasonal sell through, and effectively managed our costs.

“The transition of our online orders to Stafford DC is underway. We now expect to exit our Northampton DC by the end of the financial year, completing our network optimisation. As a result, we now expect non-underlying costs of £11m (previously £7m) in FY25 due to the phasing of costs associated with our exit from Northampton and will now incur all outstanding costs associated with our exit in FY25 (previously expected to continue into FY26).

“We expect to finish FY25 with a robust balance sheet after investing £55m in CAPEX and returning £85m to shareholders via ordinary dividends and buybacks.”