Premier Investments have reported a record half-year net profit of $71.5 million, up  25.9 per cent from the previous corresponding period.

The clothing and stationery retail group posted an earnings before interest and tax of $90.7 million, up 29.7 per cent from last year. The company’s total sales rose by 15.1 per cent to $565 million, while like-for-like sales increased by 6.9 per cent. Online sales jumped 47.7 per cent in the six-month period.

“This is a high quality result,”said Premier Investments chair Solomon Lew. “Sales growth is strong both in store and online, proving again that we are delighting our customers across all of our brands.”

Lew added all seven brands delivered positive like for like sales growth, demonstrating “the strength of our customer offer in each market.”

“Our two growth brands continue to excel, with Peter Alexander sales growing by 22.5 per cent and opening eight new stores during the first half. Smiggle delivered global sales growth of 46.5 per cent and our UK roll-out is progressing well ahead of schedule. We continue to believe that Smiggle has the potential to become a truly global brand,” Lew said in a statement to the ASX.

Smiggle UK opened 18 new stores in the half year and continued to trade ‘ahead of management expectations.’ At the end of the half, Smiggle UK had 42 stores trading in high traffic locations, targeting the opening of a further 28 new stores before the end of the financial year to take the total UK footprint to approximately 100 stores by Christmas 2016.

Smiggle will also open two stores in Hong Kong and a first store in Malaysia in the second half. They are targeting 50 stores across Malaysia and Hong Kong over the next five years.

Shareholders of the company will receive a fully-franked interim dividend of 23 cents per share. This is a two-cent per share increase from the previous corresponding period.

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