Furniture suffers but we are still outperforming market, says Argos

11th June 2009 | retail | Argos suffered further furniture and homeware sales declines in the past quarter, but claimed it was still outperforming the wider home furnishings market.

The category was the worst performing for the multichannel retailer as it returned a like for like sales fall of 2.8% across all sectors in the 13 weeks to 30th May. Selling prices have risen 3%.

Overall sales grew 0.9% to £937m, largely off the back of gains in the home electronics category and the impact of the five new stores it opened during the period.

Sister firm Homebase enjoyed a 5.8% sales increase with kitchens taking advantage of the absence of MFI and what the firm described as an investment in new ranges. Big-ticket Homebase sales including kitchens were up by about 15% overall.