Woolies stores to get bigger

Johannesburg - Retail group Woolworths Holdings [JSE:WHL] is growing its floorspace to offer a more diversified product range, the group said on Thursday.

Delivering annual results for the year to end-June, Woolworths said it would extend 31 stores and open 16 bigger stores during the new financial year.

Retiring CEO Simon Susman said Woolworths wanted to introduce more product items in its food division, but was limited by the many 400m² to 500m² stores it current has.      

Ideally, the group would like most of its successful stores to be 1000m² , but it was hard to get those in a mall, said Susman.

Woolies is also piloting liquor retailing. 

Incoming CEO Ian Moir, who will succeed Susman in November, also tabled his plans for the new year, including a rollout of an online retail channel and a further revamp in the fashion catalogue.

"Improved customer understanding has led to better profiling and cataloguing of stores, with an increasingly segmented offer," said Moir.  

He said South African retailers had lagged their peers elsewhere in the world, offering a great opportunity to learn from the mistakes of those who had gone before. 

The online channel will offer the majority of the Woolworths catalogue, including food, clothing, home and beauty products.

Sounding ambitious and innovative, Moir also committed himself to stopping the decline in the Australian business Country Road, and turning around the underperforming financial services business.

The group reported a 24.7% growth in adjusted headline earnings per share to 157.2 cents. Turnover was up 10.5%, with second-half sales having grown by 16%.

The group said while trading remains tough, there were encouraging signs ahead, and it has been on an upward trend since March last year.

"We're in good shape to take on whatever comes our way," said Moir.

 - Fin24.com