Christmas is on the horizon and the recovery at Marks & Spencer is gathering momentum at exactly the right time to capitalise on that.
From a shareholder's point of view there wasn't much to dislike in this morning's interim results, with pre-tax profits for the six months to October up 17% on the same period last year. This was driven by a very strong performance in the food division.
Generally a low-margin business, grocery is currently a sweet spot for M&S as its customers tend not to have the same spending constraints that impact other supermarkets. With the run-up to the festive season now in full effect, the retail group looks set to make merry.
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There will be a hangover next year, however, as M&S chief executive Stuart Machin warned that the company can't rule out the possibility of putting up its prices in 2025 following the tax increase announced by Chancellor Rachel Reeves in last week's Budget.
The hike in employers’ National Insurance (NI) contributions will increase the group's annual tax bill by about £60 million next year to £520m. The rise in the national minimum wage announced in the Budget will also cost about £60m, and comes on top of this year's increase of roughly 10%.
“We’ll do everything we can to make sure that cost is not passed on to consumers," Mr Machin said. “It’s not easy but that’s our ambition.”
But he added that the group "cannot rule anything out" with the long-term impact on the company's customers and suppliers "uncertain".
It has taken M&S a long time to right its ship from the days when its clothing was woefully out of fashion, but it now appears to have achieved this goal with clothing and home sales also performing well in the first half of the financial year. It has also been successful in reducing its cost base but this will be a bigger challenge going forward.
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