Wren Kitchens’ parent company has recorded a net loss of over £15m in its latest financial report, also shedding another 500 jobs in the last 12 months.
West Retail Group’s latest annual report saw the company’s 2024 pre-tax profits fall to £1.03m – a massive reduction from 2023’s profits of £35.1m. This marks a significant decline from West Retail Group’s record year in 2022, in which profit hit a high of £75.9m.
The Group has also seen a slight decline in its turnover compared to 2023, dropping around 4%. The company closed the 2024 year with sales of £949.3m, down from the previous year’s turnover of £991.6.
This means that West Retail Group made a total net loss of more than £15m in the 2024 financial year, marking a reversal of fortunes from its net profit of £14.9m achieved in the year before.
The company also says its employee headcount has reduced by more than 500 people. This time last year, the Group said it employed a total of 7,631 people, which has now dropped to 7,129 – a reduction of more than 6.5%.
This follows West Retail also losing more than 1,200 members of staff in 2023, meaning the company has lost more than 20% of its workforce over the last two years.
Despite these less than ideal results, the company’s group strategic report said that directors are “satisfied” with the year’s results.
West Retail Group is the parent company behind two companies. Wren Kitchens Limited retails kitchens and bedrooms within the UK market, and the Group’s stateside arm, Wren US Holdings Limited, does the same thing in the United States.
“Whilst both businesses carry out very similar operations, they are at completely different stages of their development,” the strategic report continued.
“In the United Kingdom, Wren Kitchens, despite having a fraction of the number of outlets of its competitors, is already the number one kitchen retailer in the country. In the United States of America, Wren US Holdings Limited is investing heavily in anticipation of future growth.”
Despite 2024’s turnover figure being reportedly “the third highest in the company’s history”, the Group said Wren’s new 1.3m sq ft UK manufacturing facility has, and will, continue to experience “significant inefficiencies and duplicated costs in the short term until the volumes being put through the factory increase”.
The Group also acknowledged that new UK retail store openings had “largely been put on hold over the previous two years” as the company prioritised increasing its bedroom offering and expanding its presence in the US market. However, the company’s directors now say they feel “comfortable” recommencing with showroom openings in the UK, with four having opened in the last year.
Similarly, earlier in the year Wren revealed exclusively to kbbreview that it plans to redouble its focus on the UK market to open a retail store “in every town and city in the country” over the next several years.
At the end of the 2024 financial year, Wren reportedly had 115 UK showrooms, and is “confident that the pace of showroom openings will accelerate during 2025 and beyond”.