CVS Group appoints Richard Fairman as finance director

Fairman spent six years at the RAC Group, where he was CFO from 2016. Before that, he worked at PricewaterhouseCoopers and held roles including FD of Virgin Money, chief financial officer of Central Trust and FD of Virgin Money Giving.

Chief executive officer Simon Innes said: "His wealth of experience in multi-site, consumer-facing, acquisitive organisations will bring significant benefit to the group and we look forward to working with him going forward.

"I would also like to thank to Nick Perrin for his invaluable contribution to the company over the past five and a half years. Nick will be stepping down from the board on 31 October 2018, following a handover period and completion of the FY2018 audit. Nick has played an important part in driving the business forward and we wish him well in the future."

CVS is due to release a full-year trading update at the end of July. Peel Hunt said it expects stronger like-for-like sales in the second half to result in profits in line with expectations.

"The company will update on its progress on acquisitions, which should be accretive to earnings in 2019 as it invests the £60m proceeds from its recent placing," the brokerage said.

At 1325 BST, the shares were down 0.8% to 1,1139p.