(Reuters) -British bicycle and car products retailer Halfords Group reported a fall in annual profit on Thursday as footfall across its stores declined due to challenging market conditions and wet weather.
The prolonged cost-of-living crisis has forced Britons to cut spending on discretionary spending, particularly big-ticket purchases like electric bikes and satellite navigation systems.
“Elevated cost inflation continued to be a significant headwind, increasing the cost base by approximately 37 million pounds in fiscal 2024,” the company said in a statement.
In February, Halfords said it was seeing “very challenging and exceptional short-term market conditions” and was cautious about a recovery.
Underlying pre-tax profit from total operations came in at 36.1 million pounds ($45.62 million) for the year ended March 29, compared with 44.2 million pounds it logged in the previous year.
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Analysts on average were expecting the firm to clock a profit of about 36.2 million pounds, according to a company-compiled consensus.
($1 = 0.7913 pounds)
(Reporting by Echha Jain in Bengaluru; Editing by Subhranshu Sahu)
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