A failed inaugural TV advertising campaign and growing competition from value retailers saw full-year profits plunge at Wilko.
In the 12 months to January 2015, the variety store business delivered pre-tax profits of just £5.5m, down from the previous year's £27.6m. Sales continued the slide of the previous two years, falling 1.2% to £1.4bn.

Wilko ran its first national TV advertising campaign, featuring pirates, during the year. But finance director Ian Ellis admitted it had been a flop.

"We entered the year with an air of optimism as we planned to screen our first TV campaign over Easter 2014," he said.

"Disappointingly, this did not deliver the anticipated increase in number of customers visiting our shops during the year and overall we continued to lose market share."

A further television campaign has now been put on hold.

Wilko also said that supermarkets and discount chains such as Aldi and Lidl had had a negative impact on its performance: "We have seen the effect of this in those categories where we compete with the grocers, such as household cleaning," it stated.

In addition, it conceded that costs relating to online fulfilment remained far too high.

Nevertheless, Wilko still plans to add 14 more outlets to its current 370 this year, and says trading has picked up since Christmas.