Moss Bros banks on Bespoke making the cut

MENSWEAR retailer Moss Bros has high hopes for the rest of the year from the launch of its new Moss Bespoke concept early next month.

The company – which is expected to update on recent trading on Friday – is opening a new flagship store in the City of London to cater for an increasing demand for customisation among shoppers.

With prices starting at 250, customers can select the right cut to flatter their shape, choose fabrics and add details such as personalised embroidery and buttonhole trims.

Bespoke suits were previously the preserve of the wealthy few, but the company also plans Moss Bespoke outlets in Manchester and Oxford.

The group already has more than 150 stores in the UK including 116 Moss and Moss Bros Hire outlets, as well as 35 stores in its fashion division including Cecil Gee, Hugo Boss, Canali and Beale & Inman.

The move into bespoke comes ahead of what is likely to be a tricky trading period for the business with the looming World Cup.

At the time of its full year results in March, finance director Michael Hitchcock said the last time England played in a World Cup in Germany, shopping centres were empty of men when the football was on.

South West Water owner Pennon and Severn Trent both post annual profits figures as the industry braces itself for the next five years under a tougher settlement from water regulator Ofwat.

Pennon said Ofwat had set it a "very tough challenge" to meet a real-terms 1 per cent cut in bills by 2015 when the firm had called for price hikes.

South West Water – the UK's dearest water company – is also facing a revenue squeeze amid lower demand and customers looking to cut back their bills through installing water meters.

Analysts at Evolution predict this could wipe 3 per cent off revenues, although the consensus forecast is for Pennon to push up pre-tax profits from 159m to 171.2m on Tuesday with help from its Viridor waste management business.

Angelos Anastasiou at Ambrian said: "Pennon's exposure to waste management should leave it more geared to economic recovery than the other water companies."

Severn Trent, which serves more than eight million customers, has already cut shareholder dividends by 10 per cent to help meet Ofwat's demand of a 4 per cent reduction in bills by 2015.

Consensus forecasts put pre-tax profits at 324.1m – up from 274m the previous year – although again the focus on Friday will be on the outlook for the next regulatory period.

Although the firm continued to face economic pressure in the third quarter of the year – not least from the winter weather pushing up leakages – trading is in line with expectations with bad debts steady at 2.3 per cent of turnover.

Charles Stanley analyst Tina Cook said: "Encouragingly, the well-flagged decline in consumption from commercial customers stabilised, with the impact on revenues in the current year now expected to be a more modest 5m to 10m."