Majestic Wine hopes to get its fizz back

MAJESTIC Wine’s new boss will give an early indication of how he plans to put some fizz back into the business when he presents the retailer’s annual results this week.

Analysts expect full-year pre-tax profits at Majestic to have fallen by about 12 per cent after a challenging Christmas period. Picture: Getty/Hemera

Rowan Gormley joined the group, which has 15 Scottish sites, after it bought online rival Naked Wines – a company he had founded and run since 2008 – for up to £70 million, .

Analysts at Investec expect full-year pre-tax profits at 
Majestic to have fallen by about 12 per cent to £21 million, after a challenging Christmas period which saw it forced to cut margins and increase promotions to lift sales.

But shares have rallied since the deal with Naked was announced in the spring, on hopes that Gormley can inject some entrepreneurial zest into the retailer that was launched from a single store in London’s Wood Green in 1980.

The hope in the City is that the new boss will use his brand building experience to exploit the group’s database of 640,000 active customers and invest in its IT systems.