Outdoor lifestyle clothing brand Fat Face is to float on the London Stock Exchange and hopes to raise around £110m.
Like-for-like revenue for the 35 weeks to 1 February 2014 was up 8.4 per cent to £142m at the retailer.
Fat Face, which operates 207 UK stores, described its customers as “settled” in a regulatory filing released this morning. “78 per cent are married or co-habiting and more than four out of ten having children under the age of 16,” it explained.
Sir Stuart Rose, Chairman of FatFace, said: “FatFace has gone from strength to strength in recent years under the leadership of Anthony and his senior management team.”
It wants to open 8-10 new stores every year and is aiming to open 450,000 and 500,000 sq ft of new space over the next five years. It said it would embark on a “carefully controlled” trial of two or three stores on the east coast of the US in the next two years.
The brand was formed in 1988, when Jules Leaver and Tim Slade began selling t-shirts and sweatshirts in Meribel and Val d‘Isère in the French Alps to fund their outdoor lifestyle. In 1992, it was launched in the UK, opening its first UK store in Fulham, London.
