Mothercare’s latest half-year results on Tuesday came just three months after it had reported its full-year figures, but we have no objection to companies reporting more promptly. So what did they show?
Mothercare
The brand owner said the 26 weeks to late September showed worldwide retail sales by franchise partners of £90.7 million, down 25% from £121.2 million, or a fall of 22% at constant currency.
This “largely” resulted from ongoing store closures in its Middle Eastern markets and the planned exit from Boots in the UK. On a like-for-like basis retail sales were down ‘only’ 6% on last year.
It made adjusted EBITDA of £0.8 million, down from £1.7 million, and the group adjusted loss from operations was £0.5 million, worse than the £1.1 million profit a year earlier. The adjusted loss before taxation was £1.1 million, narrower than the loss of £1.4 million this time last year. And the net loss narrowed slightly to £1.7 million from £1.8 million. The company’s net debt fell to £5.8 million from £17.1 million.
The sales fall came as in Middle Eastern markets a net 50 stores were closed in the 12 months to 27 September. These closures were as a result of the “region-wide reduction in footfall and resultant sales, driven by the continuing regional unrest and evolving consumer behaviour. However we do not expect any further significant store closures, as now that the majority of the old inventory has been cleared the profitability of our franchise partner is improving, despite the challenges currently facing retailers in the region”.
Big international deals
Also internationally, Mothercare said it’s made “significant progress” with both the India joint venture with Reliance Brands Ltd and the license agreement for Türkiye, with Ebebek Mağazacılık AŞ.
In October 2024 it announced the Reliance deal with an entry valuation of around £30 million for the South Asian region.
It retains a residual 49% shareholding in the new joint venture company covering Mothercare’s franchise operations in India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bhutan and Bangladesh, which was granted perpetual rights for the use of the Mothercare brand and related intellectual property in those regions.
For FY25, its retail sales in India had amounted to £18.6 million and contributed around £0.4 million to adjusted EBITDA. But in FY24 under the previous franchise arrangements those figures were ar £24 million retail sales and £0.9 million adjusted EBITDA.
That may seem like it’s going backwards but despite receiving revenues at lower rates than previously, it noted that “Reliance have recently confirmed their aspirations for the reinvigorated business to significantly grow revenue levels, and we believe it is possible for them to grow their retail sales to around £300 million in five years, supported by a store opening programme targeting 50 new stores in the region in 2026. We also expect to benefit from both sourcing fees (supplying the joint venture with product) together with the value creation accruing to our residual 49% equity stake”.
As for the Türkiye deal, that was announced in June this year. Its partner Ebebek has some 280 stores and an online business producing revenues of around £400 million together with three stores recently opened in the UK. The license agreement gives Ebebek the exclusive right to use the Mothercare brand in Türkiye on products either designed and sourced by Ebebek or Mothercare for a period of 10 years.
It also allows Mothercare to purchase products Ebebek has sourced for itself, either under its own brands or Mothercare, for sale by its franchise partners outside of the territories where Ebebek trades and to rebrand these products with the Mothercare brand if relevant.
Ebebek is launching Mothercare products in-store imminently, with the full range available in the spring. And it has “expressed interest in extending the relationship to other territories”.
While the headline numbers in the half-year report didn’t look great for the brand, there were obvious signs of improvement in some areas, especially those international deals.
And Clive Whiley, chairman of Mothercare, seemed happy enough. He 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”, he noted that the 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”.
Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Madrid (MBFWMadrid), the showcase organised by Ifema with the support of Madrid City Council, will extend its next edition to five days, running from March 18 to 22, 2026, to accommodate the large number of designers.
MBFWMadrid will extend its March 2026 edition to five days and will feature 30 designers. – MBFWMadrid
The event will add an extra day of catwalk shows after receiving a record number of applications, allowing more proposals to be included in the official schedule, according to Ifema in a statement, which also confirms that 30 designers will present their autumn-winter collections.
The expanded schedule “reinforces the growth momentum” that MBFWMadrid is experiencing and “consolidates its position as the benchmark platform for Spanish design,” the organisation noted.
The decision was agreed by the MBFWMadrid Fashion Committee, a key body in the platform’s “transformation and strategic repositioning” process. This committee is made up of professionals from fashion, luxury, communications and business, together with the event’s management.
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Despite the persistent crisis affecting the fashion sector, the Italian footwear industry is beginning to show signs of recovery, even as it closes the year down 3.1%: the third quarter, in fact, ended with a 0.9% decline, “a markedly better result than the steep contractions experienced in the first half of the year,” notes a press release from Assocalzaturifici.
Giovanna Ceolini
“The current overall picture remains complex and spares not even the highest end of the market, but the third-quarter figures point to a slowing of the decline and a first glimmer of light at the end of the recessionary tunnel,” said Giovanna Ceolini, president of Assocalzaturifici. “Despite the lack of significant improvements on the geopolitical front, our companies’ ability to maintain a strong foothold in European markets and to capture demand in the most dynamic areas, such as the Middle East, is key to navigating 2026. Although business performance is uneven, with several firms still under strain, the modest downturn expected in full-year revenue (estimated at 12.8 billion euros) confirms the resilience of Made in Italy.”
On the foreign trade front, exports reached 7.72 billion euros (-1.3%) in the first eight months of 2025. The most significant figure concerns volumes: 131.8 million pairs were sold abroad, up 4.3%. This recovery in volume was accompanied by a normalisation of average prices (58.58 euros per pair, -5.3%), signalling a correction after the double-digit increases of 2022/2023.
The EU (which takes seven out of every ten pairs exported) is growing in both value (+2.2%) and volume (+7.6%). Germany stands out with a solid 6% rise in value and 10% in pairs, while positive results were also recorded in Spain, Poland, Belgium, and Austria. Outside the EU, the Middle East remains the most dynamic region, with overall value up 13%, driven by a surge in the United Arab Emirates (+20%). Turkey and Mexico also performed well. The Far East, by contrast, remains under pressure, with a contraction of more than 20% in both volume and value, affected by the sharp slowdown recorded in China (-24.6% in value) as well as in all the other main Asian markets (Hong Kong, Japan,and South Korea), and by the CIS region (-9.2%, with -17.8% in Russia), still hampered by the conflict.
“The US market remains under close watch, with the eight-month period closing up 2.9% in value against a decline in volumes (-4.2%). The sector is cautiously assessing the impact of the tariffs set under the US-EU agreement: while August registered a discouraging -17.8% in value, preliminary September data show a responsiveness that was, in some respects, unexpected. To date, 55% of member companies exporting to the US judge the effects of the tariffs to be far from negligible, with one in five companies facing severe difficulties,” the note concludes.
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It appears M&S can do little wrong in the popularity stakes. A week on from scoring top when it comes to providing AI-assisted Christmas gift inspiration, the high street giant has now been ranked as the UK’s most trusted retailer in 2025.
M&S
Even that summer cyberattack appears to have worked in its favour, proving one thing: “The difficulty shoppers faced in finding comparable alternatives elsewhere during the outage, reinforced perceptions that Marks & Spencer offers products that are genuinely hard to replace”, according to analytics company GlobalData, which surveyed 2,000 consumers.
By restoring service and offering customers discounts in the aftermath, “the retailer further strengthened its reliability and value proposition”, it added.
“To protect its lead, Marks & Spencer must continue investing in cyber resilience, while ensuring that its quality and value messaging remain a priority”, noted the report.
As a further endorsement for British brands, John Lewis & Partners was placed second while Tesco and Sainsbury’s completed the top five most trusted retailers, with Amazon the only non-UK brand.
Their inclusion suggests that heritage brands “benefit from familiarity and perceived accountability to UK shoppers”.
It was consistent quality and clear value for money that underpins consumer trust, with 84% and 81% of consumers, respectively, citing these factors as the leading drivers of trust in retailers.
“These factors reassure shoppers that a retailer is reliable, fair, and worth returning to. Trust is enhanced when retailers deliver consistently positive experiences across stores and channels, backed by reliable customer service”.
Aliyah Siddika, associate retail analyst at GlobalData, added: “Marks & Spencer’s narrow lead in consumer trust over John Lewis & Partners is not guaranteed to remain in 2026. John Lewis & Partners has the infrastructure to communicate its quality and value-for-money message more clearly with its revived ‘Never Knowingly Undersold’ promise, which could help it overtake Marks & Spencer in the future. Notably, John Lewis ranks second despite a smaller store footprint, indicating the strength of its proposition and the potential for further momentum. Marks & Spencer must ensure that it remains committed to its focus on security and promoting its unique, quality-focused own-brand to retain shoppers’ trust.”
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