Revenue has soared by 10% at Pets at Home with the growth mainly driven by new store openings.
The group posted sales of £210.8m for the 16 weeks to July 17, with a 4% rise in like-for-like sales during the same period.
Merchandise revenues were up to £192.5m while services revenue increased by more than a quarter to £18.3m.
During the period, the group opened 10 new stores, 16 veterinary practices and 19 Groom Rooms. This included the addition of 10 veterinary and nine Grooms Rooms to existing stores.
The business plans to open at least 25 new stores, 60 veterinary practices and 50 Groom Rooms during the full year.
Nick Wood (right), Chief Executive Officer, commented: “We are pleased with the start to our financial year, with first quarter like-for-like growth of 4.1%. Our differentiated offering in the pet retail market, an increasingly seamless approach to omni-channel, and growing customer participation and engagement in our VIP loyalty programme continues to drive strong returns.
"Looking ahead, we will continue to seize opportunities to grow and develop Pets At Home and focus on the delivery of our strategy. Given the strong first quarter performance, we remain confident in our expectations for the full financial year.”
In the Interim Management Statement, the company revealed:
"Our VIP Club is an important driver of like-for-like sales growth, through targeted marketing communications to our customers, and continues to underpin our differentiated product and services proposition. We saw excellent progress in membership growth, to 2.4 million members, adding 400,000 since year end. VIP card swipes also increased to 57% of store revenues, up from 52% during the final quarter of FY14.
"We continue to invest in PetsAtHome.com, extending our website functionality and increasing the range of products. Deliver To Store is in rollout and expected to be fully operational across our store portfolio by the end of August. We now offer over 9,800 SKUs online, which represents an extended range of over 2,900 SKUs when compared to the number of SKUs available in an average superstore.
"We also returned to national TV advertising during the quarter and have been pleased with the very positive reaction to ‘MyPetMoments’, with clips crowd sourced from our customers. The full length online advertisement has now been viewed over 1.2 million times.
"A key focus for FY15 remains the delivery of at least 25 new stores, 60 new veterinary practices and 50 new Groom Room salons. Given the strong first quarter performance, continued momentum in our VIP Club, the developing maturity of veterinary practices and Groom Rooms, and plans to further enhance our Advanced Nutrition offering in stores this Autumn, we remain confident in our expectations for the full financial year."
Summary
- Like-for-like sales growth of 4.1%, driven by VIP Club momentum, strength in Advanced Nutrition and Health & Hygiene, and continued growth of our veterinary practices and Groom Rooms.
- Like-for-like revenue growth of 18.3% within the Joint Venture veterinary practices, resulting in strong fee income growth within our Services revenues.
- Total revenue grew by 10.4% to £210.8m, driven by new store openings and continued strength across Food, Accessories and Services..
- Merchandise revenues grew by 9.0% to £192.5m, with 8.8% growth in Food revenues and 9.2% growth in Accessories revenues
- Services revenues grew by 27.3% to £18.3m, reflecting both new openings and the developing maturity of our veterinary practices and Groom Rooms
- VIP Club reached 2.4m members, up from 2m at FY14 end
