Topshop and Topman could return to the high street after Asos handed control of the fashion brand to the billionaire behind Vero Moda and Jack & Jones in a £135m deal.
The online fashion seller said it had sold a 75% stake in Topshop, the group it bought just over three years ago for £330m, to Heartland, an arm of Bestseller, the Danish fashion business controlled by the major Asos shareholder Anders Povlsen.
The deal will help Asos repay debts, as it said sales continued to slide – by even more than the 15% it had already told the City to expect – amid a soggy summer and consumer caution in the light of high energy bills.
Povlsen, a Danish billionaire who is Scotland’s biggest landowner, already owns brands including Jack & Jones and Vero Moda through his Bestseller business.
Topshop, which had 70 stores including a flagship site on London’s Oxford Street, fell into administration in late 2020 as part of the collapse of Sir Philip Green’s Arcadia empire. It was relaunched the following year by Asos, selling clothing online only.
José Antonio Ramos Calamonte, the chief executive of Asos, said a dedicated Topshop website would be relaunched by next summer and that Bestseller had “extensive experience” of operating its own high street stores and wholesale-to-department stores, which could help raise awareness of the brand. At present, apart from online, Topshop products are only sold in Nordstrom department stores.
“We might open stores. We will consider it for sure but we have no specific agreement to open a certain number,” he said.
Shares in Asos were up 20% on Thursday afternoon after it announced the deal. The company will continue to sell Topshop and Topman items on its website but will now pay a royalty fee, which it said would dent profits by between £10-£20m this year.
The deal values Topshop at £180m, down from the £265m paid to buy the brand from administrators to Sir Philip Green’s Arcadia empire in 2021. The total £330m price tag included £65m of stock.
Asos will hold on to a 22.5% stake, and its existing Topshop partner Nordstrom just over 2%, with Heartland controlling the rest.
Analysts said net debt, which stood at £348m when last reported in April, would fall by about £150m. Asos is issuing £250m in new bonds and buying back existing ones in a deal analysts at Panmure Liberum said would “alleviate some of the short-term concerns around the company’s debt position”.
Calamonte said the sell-off would help “accelerate our strategy to both offer customers the best and most relevant product and to turn Asos into a company that delivers sustainable, profitable growth”.
Calamonte said Asos had put the Topshop brand “back in shape for growth”, having revamped its supply chain, product quality and creative direction.
He said the deal came about after unsolicited approaches, and Bestseller was selected as the most appropriate offer to “accelerate and make the brand more accessible for consumers”.
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Asos has been struggling to turn around its performance, selling off piles of unwanted stock and attempting to improve its fashion credentials as shoppers swing back to the high street after a boom in online shopping during the pandemic.
Nick Bubb, an independent retail analyst, said Mike Ashley, the founder of Sports Direct whose Frasers Group owns House of Fraser and Flannels as well as a large stake in Asos, “may not be best pleased” to see another major shareholder, Heartland, take the controlling stake in Topshop.
Calamonte said sales at Asos had continued to fall as the company pulled back on promotions to try to sell more profitably at full price.
Separately on Thursday, the clothing retailer Primark warned shareholders that comparable sales at the chain had fallen in the last six months.
It said sales were expected to decrease by about 0.5% in the six months to 14 September, driven by a 0.9% decline in the last three months.
The retailer’s owner, Associated British Foods, said: “This primarily reflects unfavourable weather in the UK and Ireland … which resulted in lower footfall and particularly impacted sales of our seasonal lines in womenswear and footwear.”