Poor CD, DVD and sweets sales drove Woolworths' like-for-like Christmas profits down by 4.6 per cent, the high street retailer has revealed.
Although total sales grew by 2.2 per cent in the six weeks ending on January 13th, the chain said in a trading update this morning that high-street price discounting, a symptom of "market weakness", had hit profits hard.
As a result Woolworths admitted that its end-of-year trading profit faced a "significant reduction" on last year's results, party reflected by "the impact of the decline in the CD and DVD sales".
"Woolworths retail found some of its traditional markets more difficult, leading to disappointing like-for-like sales over the Christmas weeks. Despite this, stock levels have been well controlled and we continue to improve our gross margins," Woolworths chief executive Trevor Bish-Jones commented.
Efforts to rejuvenate sales using its "enhanced multichannel capability", a separate joint venture with BBC Worldwide and the presence of Ladybird shops within stores had mitigated, but failed to stop, the slide.
Today's announcement from the high-street chain underlines the mixed Christmas performances revealed so far by other retailers, which has seen price discounting undermine robust sales levels.
Despite today's statement, shares in Woolworths rose by 1.5 per cent on early morning trading.
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