Gavin Peck, a former commercial director of Card Factory has just been appointed as chief executive officer of The Works. Dean Hoyle, founder of Card Factory continues as chairman, non-executive director and shareholder of The Works varietal value chain whose product mix spans greeting cards, stationery, gifts, toys, books and arts & crafts.
Coming into effect today (January 16), Kevin Keaney, who has been ceo of The Works for almost nine years resigned from the post stating that he feels “now is the right time for me to hand over to a new CEO to lead The Works through its next phase of development.”
Gavin joined The Works in April 2018 as chief financial officer. Prior to this he has spent seven years working at Card Factory as its commercial director.
The change in directorship coincides with The Works announcing its interim results for the six months to 27 October 2019 as well as a trading statement for the 11 weeks to 12 January 2020.
The trading statement revealed that its like-for-like sales were up 1.5%, describing it as a ‘Record Christmas sales performance delivered against tough comparatives and a difficult consumer backdrop’. Sales the previous year were up 4.5% for the same period.
While there were ‘Strong sales of core Christmas offering, including benefits of new product ranges and merchandising initiatives, as well as sales of products linked to Frozen 2 film release’ this was followed by a ‘slower start to post-Christmas sale leading to increased discounting to improve sell-through.’
Putting a dampener on its share price, the interim results showed a decline of 1.9% in like-for-like sales, attributed partly to a ‘difficult consumer backdrop.
The retailer opened 28 net new stores in the period with a further 13 opening since the Period end, taking total to 538 stores.
In his first statement as ceo, Gavin Peck revealed that: “To ensure we are well placed to deliver profitable growth in the medium-term we have taken action to refocus our strategy by opening fewer new stores, with a view to driving improved performance in our existing estate and increasing our focus on cost savings.
Top: The Works now trades from 538 stores.
