25 September 2025

Portmeirion Group PLC

(the "Group")

Interim results for the six months ended 30 June 2025

Group Sales return to growth despite significant disruption from USA import tariffs with an encouraging performance in South Korea and double-digit growth in International and Wax Lyrical

Headline loss before tax higher than prior year reflecting significant disruption from USA import tariffs

Free cash flow improved by £2.4m, however Net Debt increased by 10.4% primarily a result of impact of US tariffs on US profitability and reflects proactive measures taken to manage stock levels ahead of key Christmas trading period

Portmeirion Group PLC, the global homewares brands group, announces its results for the six months ended 30 June 2025.

Commenting on the Group's performance Mike Raybould, Chief Executive said:

"As we reported in our July trading statement, the introduction of additional import tariffs in the US market caused immediate disruption and significant uncertainty in our largest and most profitable market. We have acted quickly and proactively in our response and continue to monitor the situation closely including how it impacts consumer confidence over the Christmas period. Against this backdrop I'm delighted that we have taken the opportunity to accelerate our Made in Stoke-on-Trent onshoring initiative, increasing the proportion of product supplied into the US that is made in the UK.   

Outside of the US, we are pleased to see sales up 10.8% on a constant currency basis with an encouraging performance in our South Korea market (up 31.6% on constant currency). We anticipate growth in these markets to continue in the second half.

We are in the early stages of following through on our transformation plan launched in March and despite the ongoing global market uncertainty, I am pleased with the progress being achieved. We are making decisions every day that we believe over time will strengthen our business and deliver more consistent and profitable results for our stakeholders.

We will continue to execute on our own transformation plan, but we are disappointed that the UK Government has chosen not to take more immediate steps to support UK ceramic manufacturing and respond to the calls for action. It's been an extremely challenging few years for the industry with soaring energy prices and wider cost pressures. Targeted support to ensure a level playing field on energy costs with the rest of the world would be invaluable for the British ceramics industry, allowing its globally respected brands to compete more effectively at home and to further grow export markets thus supporting UK jobs."

Financial overview

Key performance indicators

Notes:

(1)   Headline measures exclude exceptional costs.

Summary

·    Revenue increased 1.3% to £37.1m (H1 2024: £36.6m) despite the significant disruption caused by US import tariffs. On a constant currency^[1] basis, this was +2.8%.

·    Excluding the USA, sales were 10.8% higher than prior year on a constant currency¹ basis.

·    South Korea performance encouraging with 31.6% growth in constant currency. International markets, a key part of our transformation plan, up double digit.

·    Headline loss before tax of £2.8m (H1 2024 £2.0m) due to significant disruption from USA import tariffs in our largest and most profitable market.

·    Net profitability in the USA is down $0.8m due to the impact on sales from the increased import tariffs, uncertainty from which continues.

·    Wax Lyrical returns to profit in H1, with a £0.7m improvement on last year's loss.

·    Free cash outflow improved by 46.2% to £2.8m (H1 2024: £5.2m outflow).

·    Net debt increased by £1.4m. This was driven by two factors, the lower profit in USA resulting from increased import tariffs and higher stock levels. The higher stock levels were in turn driven by general market caution in response to incremental tariffs resulting in slower sales and clearance of product. We have been proactive in delivering product earlier into the USA market for the key Christmas '25 period to avoid a repeat of the supply chain issues faced in 2024, however we remain cautious on the US consumer and sell through. The businesses priority remains to reduce net debt, but whilst we do expect some reduction in inventory levels as the normal seasonal trading builds, uncertainty will remain until stability returns to the US import tariff position, only then do we expect the macro environment to start to normalise.

·    Following the announcement of the business strategy and transformation plan on 31 March 2025, no interim dividend is proposed.

·    Outside of the USA, where sales are impacted by the incremental import tariffs, Spode sales continued to grow, being 7.5% higher at constant currency¹.

·    Wax Lyrical sales are up 15.5% to £7.1m; which continues to see positive sell through in national retailers, supported by the ongoing expansion of listings.

·    Overhead costs increased by 2.9% (£0.5m), as the business absorbed the increases in Employer's National Insurance and National Minimum Wage, inflationary cost increases and our planned increased investment in our transformation plan including sales and marketing investment.

·    The Group has agreed a revised £30m Revolving Credit Facility with Barclays, which recognises the impact of US Tariffs and supports our transformation plan whilst reflecting our highly seasonal working capital profile due to the prominence of Christmas trading where debt peaks in October and reduces rapidly in November and December.  Leverage and interest cover covenants have been replaced with Asset Cover and Adjusted EBITDA with an interest margin of 3% for the 12-month period up to and including September 2026, dropping to 1.8% thereafter until maturity on 30th April 2027.

Current trading & outlook

·   We expect the uncertainty in the USA market to continue pending more stability and clarity on incremental tariffs, particularly with China. However, we remain optimistic about the potential we see to grow in the medium and long term. We are excited to have opened our 8^th Nambe store in Dallas in July, and a Ceramics pop up store in New Jersey in August.

·    Our focus remains on the ongoing turnaround and growth of our South Korea market which we expect to show growth on prior year. We also expect the momentum we are seeing in our International business and Wax Lyrical brand to continue.

·   The Board remains mindful of the challenges ahead in what continues to be an uncertain economic environment and with a significant Q4 weighting for the business. In particular, we are closely monitoring how the US consumer will react to higher prices during the key seasonal period.

·    We remain focussed on progressing the delivery of our transformation plan, announced on 31 March 2025.

Notes:   This announcement contains inside information for the purposes of the retained UK version of the EU Market Abuse Regulation (EU) 596/2014 ("UK MAR").

ENQUIRIES:

NOTES TO EDITOR:

Portmeirion Group PLC is a global homewares brand group based in Stoke-on-Trent, England.  The Group owns six unrivalled heritage and contemporary brands; Spode, Portmeirion, Royal Worcester, Pimpernel, Wax Lyrical and Nambé.   The Group serves markets across the world, with global demand driven by diversified international markets including the key geographies of North America, the UK and South Korea.

Interim Review

Financial highlights

Whilst the year started well for the Group with good progress being made across a number of our strategic initiatives, the imposition of additional import tariffs in the USA at the beginning of Q2 caused immediate disruption and significant uncertainty in our largest and most profitable market.

Against this backdrop, revenue was £37.1 million for the first six months of the year, an increase of 1.3% over the prior year (H1 2024: £36.6 million). Excluding our USA market, sales were up 10.8% in constant currency¹.

The reduction in sales in the USA because of tariff disruption, negatively impacted our operating performance through the lower profitability of the USA business which at a loss of $0.6m was $0.8m lower than prior year in H1 (2024: profit of $0.2m).

Operating costs increased from £16.6 million to £17.1 million reflecting the increase in Employer's National Insurance and National Minimum Wage, inflationary impact on costs and the planned investment in key functions such as Sales and Finance to support the delivery of the Transformation Plan.

As a result of the reduced sales performance, headline loss before tax¹ was £2.8 million (H1 2024: £2.0m).  The statutory loss (including exceptional costs) was £2.9m (H1 2024: £2.6m).

Headline basic loss per share¹ was 20.50p (H1 2024: 15.81p).

¹ Headline profit before tax, headline operating profit and headline earnings per share excludes exceptional items (see note 3).

Operational overview

The Group's largest sales market, North America (the USA and Canada), accounted for 34.2% of total Group revenue on a reported basis. Sales were 13% below the first half of 2024 at £12.7 million (H1 2024: £14.5 million) and down 10.6% at constant currency.

As previously outlined, the USA business was significantly impacted in H1, following the announcement of substantial incremental import tariffs which created immediate and considerable uncertainty across our customer base. Given supply lead times and that substantial production and shipping was already in progress, we had to act quickly to mitigate the potential risks of penal customs tariffs. Despite this volatile situation and following our actions, we are pleased to report that we currently expect that our US customers will receive their stock in plenty of time for the seasonal period and earlier than last year; ensuring our product is in-store and available for sale at the beginning of the peak Holiday and Christmas season. However, following our active cancellation of a number of production orders from Asia because of the tariffs, we expect the overall volume of product supplied by the Group into the USA market in 2025 will be markedly down on a like-for-like basis on last year.

As a result of the tariff situation, we also made the decision to accelerate elements of our Made in Stoke-on-Trent onshoring initiative from 24 months to 3 months. In the short term, this will require a margin investment, but we believe this will deliver returns in the years to come. Similarly, following a review of our USA sales strategy, we are actively withdrawing or reducing supply of some of our brands and/or ranges to certain lower margin customers.

Our second largest market is the UK, which accounted for 36.7% of total Group sales. Sales were 3% ahead of the prior year at £13.4 million (H1 2024: £13.0 million) aided by further growth of Wax Lyrical (+15.5%), our home fragrance division, which continues to see good sell through with national retailers and further expansion of listings. This was offset by our UK tableware business which saw sales decline 8.9%, primarily due to the timing of an initial Spode new product launch order in the prior year and the planned closure of a retail factory outlet following a review of our own retail operations.

In South Korea, our third largest market accounting for 19.4% of total Group revenue, sales grew by 29.6% to £7.2 million (H1 2024: £5.6 million), up 31.6% on a constant currency basis, reflecting a promising improvement from its 2024 nadir as the new leadership structure and strategy deliver a strong performance.  We are seeing the benefit of supporting key customers with new product innovation and the progress that has been made in clearing the historic stock overhang which severely impacted the business in 2023/24 after COVID. 

In our International markets, sales grew 10.3% to £3.9 million (H1 2024: £3.5 million), up 11.2% at constant currency, driven by new distributors in key growth target markets and a strong pipeline of product innovation.  International markets are a key component of our transformation plan under our 'Explore and Develop' priority and a fundamental basis of our long-term growth strategy.

As we continue to focus on our transformation plan, our commitment to new and innovative product is stronger than ever and we are excited by the product lines we are bringing to our customers this year and the speed and agility at which our development process and Made in Stoke-on-Trent initiative have been able to progress.

Balance sheet

The Group ended the first half of 2025 with net debt of £14.8 million at 30 June 2025; this compares to net debt of £13.4 million at 30 June 2024 and net debt of £12.1 million at 31 December 2024. The increase in net debt since the year end is largely driven by:

1.    The year-to-date loss.

2.    An increase in inventory as we begin to build our holdings of seasonal product ahead of the important second half of the year which this year includes earlier build and delivery for customers in the USA.

3.    The transition to Made in Stoke-on-Trent, whilst the inventory that has been shipped to the UK in H1 from China now incurs an incremental 30% tariff.

Our stock balance at 30 June 2025 was £42.9 million compared to £40.0 million at 30 June 2024 and £38.2 million at 31 December 2024. The increase since the year end is primarily driven by the seasonal increase in inventory held as we build stock for Q3 orders around the world, with seasonal product in transit at the half year date and home fragrance inventory built for customer demand. As is normal, we expect to see inventory levels decrease in the second half of the year as these orders are fulfilled and we remain committed to reducing stock levels over the medium term.

Revolving Credit Facility

The Group has entered into a revised Revolving Credit Facility ('RCF') with our primary lender Barclays, replacing the previous leverage and interest cover covenants with Asset Cover and Adjusted EBITDA for the 12-month period up to and including September 2026.  This recognises the volatility in trading caused by US tariffs, which were announced on 2nd April 2025, just days after we launched our two-year Transformation Plan on 31 March 2025.  The modified facility carries an interest margin of 3.0% until September 2026 thereafter dropping back to the original 1.8% interest margin until the maturity date on 30 April 2027.

We have appreciated the constructive support of our lender Barclays in working with us to provide a revised RCF that is appropriate for our business in the current macro environment and underpins the continued delivery of our Transformation Plan.

Dividend

As previously outlined, the Board has not proposed an interim dividend, as our transformation plan has prioritised growth. To fund this growth, we need to invest which requires us to focus on the strengthening of our Balance Sheet to reduce net debt. As a consequence of this we will reduce our interest payments (totalling £1.6m in 2024) and reinvest in those areas that will drive growth globally.

Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG)

In May 2023, the Group launched a new sustainability strategy and roadmap entitled 'Crafting a Better Future' which outlines the Group's commitment to becoming a more sustainable business. The launch represents the next level of ambition for the Group - to ensure that we continue to reduce our impact on the environment and support our colleagues and communities.

We continue to drive our progress on reducing our energy consumption and in H1 reduced gas and electricity usage by 11% and 9% respectively compared to the prior year.

Further details on our ESG commitments and integration within the Group can be found on our website, www.portmeiriongroup.com, and in the Section 172(1) statement - Engaging with key stakeholders, Our commitment to ESG and the Corporate Governance Statements in our Annual Report and Accounts.

Corporate governance and Board

The Group is a committed member of the Quoted Companies Alliance ("QCA") and has chosen to apply the QCA Corporate Governance Code, complying with its principles throughout the period. Further details can be found on our website at www.portmeiriongroup.com/investors.

The Board keeps its composition and performance under review to ensure that we have the appropriate skills and experience in place to deliver our strategy.

Group Strategy 

TRANSFORMING OUR BUSINESS: OUR 2025-2026 PRIORITIES

In March 2025, we began the journey of transforming the business, and announced a series of immediate priorities, which the Board believes will position the Group to accelerate our strategy and objectives below, and support a recovery of long-term, profitable growth. We update on the first 3 months of progress below:

1.    RETURN TO GROWTH IN OUR ESTABLISHED MARKETS

We are focused on returning our three established markets - US, South Korea and UK - to stability and onto growth after a year of disruption.  In the US, we have accelerated in-stock dates for key Christmas collections and, in South Korea we have continued to support our distributors and retail partners to reduce stock levels and grow sales.

In the UK we have reorganised our UK tableware sales team to further develop key accounts including national and independent accounts.  Across all markets we will develop our customer base, introduce new collections and expand existing collections, develop our online and eCommerce offer and exercise better control and oversight. Also, in the UK we continue to support Wax lyrical, our home fragrance business, in growing listings and introducing new product lines that excite our customers.

2.    FORTRESS BALANCE SHEET

The introduction of incremental import tariffs has caused an increase in net debt at 30 June 2025. This is due to lower profit from the USA market following disruption to sales and the build of inventory to support our customers earlier than previous years whist also attracting an incremental 10-30% of duty increasing the value of inventory. However, we have limited the impact on net debt through strong and careful management of working capital.

We remain laser focused on generating cash and our intent is to repay our debt in full over the next 2 to 3 years to maintain a net cash position.  As we repay debt, we benefit from lower associated interest costs, which together with efficiencies and growth, releases capital for investment in marketing our premium brands in established and international markets.

3.    INVEST IN OUR PREMIUM BRANDS

Our future success and prosperity depend on how we execute and develop our premium brands globally over the next few years.  We will spend more on brand marketing in the years ahead, with certain brands seeing an anticipated c.5-8x increase in spend from current levels as funds become available.  Success will not be instant. It requires commitment, consistency and patience, and as we spend, we will evaluate effectiveness.   In all markets we will engage directly with the end customer to introduce our brands, earn their trust and loyalty, and in parallel support our retail partners and brand ambassadors to drive sales for them and our own eCommerce. 

In the last 3 months, new work has included: improving how we present our Spode brand, including the product backstamp and packaging and commencement of an improved ecommerce delivery experience for Spode in the UK and improving and expanding online digital assets for the upcoming Christmas season.

We intend to completely overhaul and re-energise our own retail store portfolio in the UK and our global eCommerce over the next 12 months to improve our customers brand experience very markedly. Increasing the proportion of branded product 'Made in Stoke-on-Trent' is an important commitment to our customer and our brands.

4.    EXPLORE & DEVELOP

International markets are defined by 57 individual markets and accounted for 8% of Group sales in 2024, with only three of those markets contributing more than £0.5m sales each.  We have the premium brands and collections to be successful in these markets, but until we build a consistent brand presence and connect with our end customer, growth will be hard fought. 

Out international sales team has begun the process of exploring and developing the initial target markets with promising success in the first half of the year.  This focus will continue through the second half of the year as we look to embed the practices to maintain the growth whilst beginning the process of targeting the next markets identified.

We are investing in our International sales team to ensure we have the infrastructure and capability to deliver on the strategy.

Explore & Develop is not just about geography and markets, it applies throughout the business.  We have a history of innovation across the business and at every level.   We are now exploring the value and potential of our extensive design archives for ceramic tableware, giftware, and licensing opportunities for other categories. 

In August we were pleased to announce the appointment of Victoria Brabender as Product Strategy Director. Victoria draws on over 20 years of experience in product and category development having worked previously at a number of notable brands including Emma Bridgewater. In this newly created role, Victoria will work with our design, marketing and sales teams as we continue to seek to develop new, beautiful products for our customers around the world. This new role will also focus on how we best leverage our extensive design archives both within tableware and other categories.

5.    EXCELLENCE EVERYWHERE

There is real opportunity for improvement across the Group and every colleague, at every level, across every department and geography can contribute to our performance improvement and transform our business.  We will ingrain Excellence Everywhere in our everyday behaviours and actions and at every level, our mindset will be one of brand first, attention to detail, and continuous improvement everywhere.  We have an open and entrepreneurial culture and a determination to succeed. Our colleagues are encouraged to take risks and learn from their mistakes to produce better results and generate a positive impact. 

As we challenge ourselves to ingrain Excellence Everywhere, we have focused on upgrading talent and capability across the business including within our Sales and Global Finance teams.

In Product, we have launched the new Spode backstamp as we embed the brand mindset and we have significantly upgraded the design and quality of our Spode brand packaging, enhancing the customer experience each time they connect with the brand and product.

In manufacturing have begun the process of improving performance and efficiency in both our Stoke-on-Trent and Lindal factories.

Outlook

We are pleased with the performance of the business outside of the USA market in the first half of the year as we see the benefit of our focus on South Korea and International markets showing early positive signs and expect this to continue into H2. We do however recognise the challenging environment we are currently operating in and are very mindful of the uncertainty created by the introduction of incremental import tariffs for the USA market, our biggest and most profitable market, as we head into the traditionally busier part of our year and the key Christmas trading period. We are confident in the actions we have taken in the US market in response to the tariff situation and, as a result, believe it will enable us to grow in this key market in the medium and long term.

The revised covenants in our banking facility provide the headroom and flexibility for the Group to continue with the Transformation Plan in the current challenging market conditions.

We are continuing the transformation of the business, started 3 months ago, as we focus on executing our plans across sales, product, key markets and investment in critical functions in support. We are excited by the opportunities that lie ahead of us as we implement these changes, but we also accept it will take time to gain significant traction and so will continue to manage the business to deliver future benefits whilst making the right decisions for the challenging times we are operating in.

Peter Tracey                                      Mike Raybould

Non-executive Chairman             Chief Executive

Unaudited Consolidated Income Statement for the six months to 30 June 2025

All the above figures relate to continuing operations.

¹Headline operating loss is statutory operating loss of £1,985,000 (H1 2024: £1,868,000 operating loss) add exceptional items of £100,000 (H1 2024: £620,000). Headline loss before tax is statutory loss before tax of £2,896,000 (H1 2024: loss before tax of £2,638,000), add exceptional items of £100,000 (H1 2024: £620,000).

Unaudited Consolidated Statement of Comprehensive Income for the six months to 30 June 2025

Unaudited Consolidated Balance Sheet for the six months to 30 June 2025