Tile specialist, Topps Tiles Plc has announced a trading update for the 13 week period ended 29 December 2018, with like-for-like revenues for the first 13 weeks of the current financial year decreased by 1.4%, when in 2018 revenue had increased by 3.4% for the same period.

However trading took a downward slope for the rest of the year, with the first eight weeks of the new financial period seeing Group revenues decrease by 1.9%.

Retail - our strategy of "out specialising the specialists" continues to serve us well, Topps Tiles said in its report. Digital remains at the heart of its multi-channel business, with almost all of its customers utilising the digital aspects of its offer and its stores as part of their journey. The Group is now trading from 367 stores, in Q1 2018 the figure was at 371, having opened one and closed two stores during the period, but the company has said the flexibility of its core estate is a "key strength". 

Commercial - we continue to make good progress with our plans for commercial and our strategy of "disrupt and construct" is proving successful. Topps has focused on recruiting an experienced salesforce and are evaluating opportunities to further strengthen the team, it said. "We are building an encouraging pipeline of future potential projects and are on track to open two new showrooms during the second quarter; bringing the total to four". 

Chief executive officer at Topps Tiles, Matthew Williams commented: "Against a challenging market backdrop and a strong period of performance in the prior year we believe the business has performed robustly over the first quarter.  We remain excited by both the opportunity for profitable growth that our expansion into commercial segment will bring and the continued opportunity to further strengthen our market leading position overall."