It has emerged that Dollond & Aitchison's decision to make its 90 contact lens opticians redundant followed a weaker half-year performance by the multiple.
De Rigo, the Italian parent of the UK opticians name, has released sales performances for the first six months of this year, in the run-up to July's redundancy announcement by D&A.
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| Sales down at D&A |
The figures also revealed that D&A's 140 franchised outlets had a weakened performance, at €32.3m, a fall of 8 per cent on 2005 (a decline of 5.6 per cent in sterling terms).
At June 30 2005, D&A's network extended to 235 owned outlets as well as its 140 franchised businesses.
A spokesman at De Rigo commented: 'D&A's results were negatively affected by declines in sales in both value and volume terms, which reflected a general downturn in the British optical market.'
Overall De Rigo - which has the rights to Police, Givenchy and other fashion names - found the going tough with net sales for the six months down by 3 per cent to €267.5m (eyewear 122.6m, prescription lens €80m, contact lens sales €39.6m, with other sales and revenues €25.3m). In Europe, where the lion's share of De Rigo's business is done, net sales amounted to €238m, a fall of 3.8 per cent.
The company's wholesale and manufacturing interests continued to be hit by the 2004 expiry of the licence agreement with Fendi, and De Rigo posted sales of €79.4m (2004: €82.8m), down 4.1 per cent.
The spokesman said: 'Management expects that the negative impact on the segment's sales of the expiry of the Fendi licence will eventually be more than offset by increased sales under the new licence agreements De Rigo signed with Chopard, Ermenegildo Zegna, Escada and Jean Paul Gaultier during the last quarter of 2004 and first quarter of 2005.'
Deliveries of Chopard and Escada-branded eyewear have only just started, while those of Ermenegildo Zegna and Jean Paul Gaultier products have not yet begun.