Slater Menswear is to launch a transactional web site next month offering products from all its departments.

The family business, which has 24 stores, predominantly in Scotland and the north of England, hopes the site will help raise its profile across the rest of the country.

Slater buying manager Tony Links said: “This is going to be very big for us. We hope that people will use it to buy, look at stock before coming to store and it will mean that more people will know about us.”

The retailer has also begun the roll-out of a store refit programme, which it wants to complete in the next few years.

“We want all the stores to be more like our Manchester shop which we relocated to new premises 18 months ago. This store is doing really well for us,” Links said.

This spring, Slater began to move away from its traditional discount model and began selling at RRP. All goods will be sold at full price from autumn.

The strategy has helped Slater attract more brands, including Timberland, Esprit and Nike Golf.

Brands such as Esprit will also be tested in shop-in-shop formats to give them a greater presence within stores.

Links added that both the suit and suit hire divisions were performing particularly well in what he described as “steady but challenging” conditions.

Growth at the hire business, which was set up three years ago, was 50 per cent up on last year.