Topps Tiles scraps dividend as revenue slips

Archived article

Please note that tax, investment, pension and ISA rules can change and the information and any views contained in this article may now be inaccurate.

Flooring retailer Topps Tiles swung to a full-year loss and scrapped its final dividend after sales slipped due to store closures owing to the pandemic.

The company also wrote down the value of its budding commercial tiles business, to the tune of £5.6 million, 'based on a prudent view of the commercial market following Covid-19'.

Pre-tax losses for the year through 26 September amounted to £9.8 million, compared to a year-on-year profit of £12.5 million, as revenue sank 12% to £192.8 million.

Topps Tiles said the lower revenue partly reflected temporary store closures in the third quarter, though it said like-for-like sales had bounced back by 16.5% in the fourth quarter.

Topps Tiles said it was keen to re-instate its dividend policy as soon as was appropriate. 'This should be possible in the new financial year, subject to delivering a positive adjusted EPS,' it added.

In the first eight weeks of the new financial period, retail like-for-like revenues had jumped 19.6%, with the retail business benefitting from an increase in home improvement activity.

'In what has been a very challenging year, I am pleased with our response as a business, in the resilience we have shown and, in particular, the strong bounce-back in retail sales delivered since the initial national lockdown,' chief executive Rob Parker said.

At 8:00am: (LON:TPT) Topps Tiles PLC share price was 0p at 47p