High street health and beauty chain Boots has reported a £71 million slump in sales for the last financial year.
Bosses have pointed to the "highly competitive nature" of the industry in the Boots UK financial report for 2018, which also showed a £158 million fall in revenue for the 12 months to August 31.
According to the report, profit for the year stands at £317 million, down from £388m, with revenue for the year being reported as £6.79 billion.
In the report, the board of directors stated: "The company's retail revenue, gross profit and gross profit margin are impacted by, among other things, the highly competitive nature of the health and beauty category.
"In particular, our own and our competitors' pricing actions, promotional offers and events and the customer's desire for value and convenience."
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On pharmacy sales, the directors added the sales and profits were affected by "governmental agencies seeking to minimise increases in the costs of healthcare, including pharmaceutical drug reimbursement rates".
The report has been released just weeks after Boots' parent company, Walgreens Boots Alliance, said it would need to reduce and slash costs after the "most difficult" quarter in the group's history.
This led to the group revealing it would look at poor performing shops as well as "opportunities for consolidation".
Speaking to Nottinghamshire Live previously, Boots UK managing director, Sebastian James, said the chain needed to move more quickly to adapt to changes in the future, stating investment would need to be made to make the group fit for the modern retail world.
He said: "We could rise and fall with the markets - and the market's in decline at the moment - but I think our best opportunity now is to continue to invest hard in the stores, in digital, in pharmacy and our dot com presence where we are doing lots of exciting things and growing very fast.
"These are things we must embrace and love if we are going to adapt and be a modern retailer and we are quite a long way from that today."
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