The fashion retailer suffered an 81.7% crash in statutory pre-tax profit to £1.7m in the 26 weeks to November 24, 2019 after booking £6.7m of exceptional charges relating to stores, head office premises and changes in distribution arrangements.

On an underlying basis, pre-tax profit was down 9.3% to £9.7m during the 26-week period, as group sales dipped 1.4% to £111.6m.

Joules said the results were impacted by the timing of the Black Friday sales bonanza, which falls in the second half of its current financial year, as opposed to the first half of 2018/19.