The fashion chain and British success story SuperGroup has ended its expansion in the UK, according to its chief executive.
Euan Sutherland said the brand behind Superdry, which started out on a Cheltenham market stall 30 years ago and now has 100 sites, had enough stores in the UK and would be focusing overseas.
He said: “We’re getting to the point where we’re at our optimum UK estate. There are very few new cities we are targeting and most of our growth is in Europe.
“The UK is a very web-savvy population so the balance between e-commerce and retail is about right.
“Going back five years, the plan was to have 150 stores, but that’s changed and 100 has been on the table for a little while.
“E-commerce is doing so well that you need fewer stores and we only have 30 stores in Germany, where there’s a bigger market to grow in.”
The comments come as the company revealed a stellar boost in sales, up 22.4 per cent in the six months to 24 October, to £254.9m.
Sales in its stores grew 17.2 per cent on a like-for-like basis and there was 8 per cent growth in its wholesale business, in which its garments are sold by third parties.
Shareholders were impressed, sending the shares up 9 per cent to 1,619p, a level not seen for 19 months and the highest since Mr Sutherland replaced Supergroup’s founder, Julian Dunkerton, a year ago.
Mr Sutherland said the company had been helped by a sharper focus on womenswear and by the introduction of better new ranges, while the Rugby World Cup had inspired shoppers to snap up casual rugby shirts.
SuperGroup will offer some Black Friday deals and Mr Sutherland also suggested that the shopping event imported from the United States could start to infect parts of continental Europe.
He said: “The UK embraced Black Friday fully last year for the first time, but we didn’t see it embraced in Europe and we think there will be more European countries that adopt it.”
