Fishing Republic expects a 40% rise in revenue

Shares in Fishing Republic climbed on Monday as it said that 2016 results are anticipated to be inline with expectations with a rise in revenue as the fishing tackle retailer moves away from sales from third party platforms to its own website.

For calendar 2016, revenue is expected increase about 40% year-on-year, due to new store openings, organic growth across existing stores, and own website sales.

The AIM-listed company is transitioning online sales away from third party platforms to its own website, where margins are higher and as a result, own website sales surged 132% YoY and accounted for about 40% of total online sales.

As the company expected, with lower third party sales, total online sales fell but overall gross margins improved.

The new stores in south Birmingham, Crewe and Hull, which were opened in the first half of 2016 are building sales in line with forecasts and the Lincoln store, bought last September, has seen sales that are ahead of the prior year.

The company has also opened new stores in Mildenhall and Milton Keynes, while two stores in Reading and Ipswich are expected to open before the end of March with further openings planned in the year.

Shares in Fishing Republic were up 15.38% to 45p at 0801 GMT.