Mothercare has recorded a loss and falling sales in its first half as it drastically reduced its store count with its franchise partners.
Turnover for the 26 weeks to September 27 fell to £11.6m, down from £21m year on year, and adjusted EBITDA declined to £0.8m from £1.7m.
Group adjusted loss before tax improved slightly to -£1.1m from -£1.4m.
Global retail sales by franchise partners fell to £90.7m from £121.2m, down 25% and 22% on a constant currency basis. Like-for-like basis retail sales were down 6% on last year.
The decline largely came from the store closures in the Middle East and the planned exit from books.
Online retail sales fell to £10m from £12.2m, while the total number of franchise stores has dropped from 440 to 344.
Mothercare chair Clive Whiley said: “Mothercare is making good progress against our strategic priorities. After the strategic and operational challenges of the last few years, our performance in the first half shows that Mothercare has been stabilised as a smaller and cash-generative business with greatly reduced debt.
“Our new partnerships with Reliance in South Asia and Ebebek in Turkey are now bearing fruit, underlining the intrinsic value of, and opportunity for, our brand.
“From this position of relative strength, our key focus for 2026 is to pursue options to rebuild our scale and operations both in the UK and globally, alongside pursuing the refinancing of our existing debt financing facilities. This is an exciting prospect for our partners, our colleagues and all our stakeholders as we look towards the new year and those opportunities ahead.”
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