Former Dragons’ Den star Theo Paphitis is targeting a first ever profit for his lingerie stores chain Boux Avenue despite its losses widening.
Paphitis said the company had seen growth in the year to April 1, 2024, thanks to “improved margins, digital marketing and the distribution efficiencies”.
He added that Boux Avenue saw an “encouraging” performance over Black Friday, Christmas and Valentine’s Day and that he expects to see a “significant further improvement in the new financial year”.
The update has been included in heavily delayed accounts for the chain for the 12 months to April 1, 2023.
The accounts have been filed with Companies House more than five months after the deadline had passed.
It is due to publish its results for the 12 months to March 31, 2024, by the end of the year.
Theo Paphitis
According to the results, Boux Avenue’s turnover fell from £67.1m to £62.6m in the year to April 1, 2023, while its pre-tax losses widened from £1.5m to £8.7m.
Since being founded in 2011, Boux Avenue has never made a pre-tax profit.
In April 2024 Boux Avenue received a loan of £5m from Radleigh Lakes Limited, a company controlled by Paphitis and Kypros Kyprianou, who is chief executive of the wider retail group.
Automation helps improve margins at Boux Avenue
In a statement signed off by the board, chairman Theo Paphitis said: “The Boux Avenue brand made further progress but faced challenges that impacted our performance in relation to external factors such as the cost of living crisis and the reintroduction of business rates following Covid-19.
“Within our business we were significantly impacted by difficulties relating to the implementation of a key project, delivering automation in our distribution centre.
“The distribution centre project involved a direct investment of around £2.6m, as well as further cost in time and management.
“The automated operations have now provided an increase in capacity and efficiency, as well as the expected financial return, however, in the year reported which covered peak trading for 2022, we were forced to scale back our marketing and trading in e-commerce which resulted in us missing our sales plans.
“The costs incurred as well as the loss of sales at the key time contributed materially to the financial performance reported.”
Theo Paphitis eyeing future growth
On the latest trading of Boux Avenue, Paphitis added: “We have recently completed the financial year ended 2024 and are pleased to have seen an improvement in our profitability due to improved margins, digital marketing and the distribution efficiencies outlined.
“Our performance over the peaks of Black Friday, Christmas and Valentine’s was encouraging and we expect to see a significant further improvement in the new financial year.