Today Carpetright PLC (LON:CPR), released its interim results for the 26 weeks ended 31 October 2015 where the company stated that they saw an increase in sales in both Europe and the UK whilst the Group’s full year underlying profit expectations are unchanged.

The company noted that group revenue increased 1.4% to £231.2m (H1 FY15: £227.9m) whilst there was a significant improvement in underlying profit before tax, which was up 34.3% to £9.0m (H1 FY15: £6.7m).

Wilf Walsh, Carpetrights Chief Executive, said:

“I am pleased to be able to report the Group continued its positive like-for-like sales performance and grew profits significantly during the first half. In parallel, we made good further progress with a wide-ranging programme of initiatives to extend the appeal of the Carpetright brand and address significant legacy property issues.

“The trial of a new retail concept and brand identity is, as expected, producing much valuable customer insight. A comprehensive customer research study will be completed by the end of January 2016, giving us a more detailed picture which will inform our decisions on which elements we will roll-out across the existing estate.
“In a retail market which remains very competitive, we are confident that our plan to build on Carpetright’s strong foundations, modernise the business, and ensure we capitalise on our advantages as market leader to the full, is on track. Our full year profit expectations remain unchanged.”

Carpetright said the boost in underlying profit was supported by “strong profit growth in the UK and improved trading in our Rest of Europe businesss”.

Despite the positive results the board decided not to pay an interim dividend due to the priority of accelerating reductions in fixed occupancy costs and plans to invest in remaining stores with an aim to broaden the appeal of the brand.