Carpet retailer Carpetright says it is reaping rewards from its investment in multichannel sales.
The company says that it is seeing significant traffic to the site, resulting in hundreds of appointments a week. Each week some 55,000 unique visitors arrive at the carpetright.co.uk site, resulting in 800 samples being sent out and almost 700 appointments being made. The Carpetright website offers free measuring and estimating appointments.
“The samples/appointment leads can be specifically tracked to store sales, demonstrating the importance of having an effective and integrated multichannel proposition,” said the company in its half-year results announcement to the stockmarket today.
The company added that pre-tax profits fell to £9.8m in the 26 weeks to October 30 from £11m at the same time last year. Total group sales was also down, at £248.0m from £258.0m last time, with like-for-like sales down by 6.1% in the UK and Ireland. But at the same time net debt fell by £12.8m to £58.5m.
Lord Harris of Peckham, chairman and chief Executive, said the company had remained profitable against a ‘challenging’ economy.
He said: “Whilst we remain cautious about the retail market in the balance of the financial year and throughout 2011, the board has confidence that the group is well positioned to deliver future sales growth when consumer demand in our sector improves.”
The company’s strategy is therefore focusing on measures including developing additional sales channels, such as multichannel.
The Carpetright website was voted retail website of the year in the Retail Systems Awards 2010.
