Profile: Philip Day, chief executive, Edinburgh Woollen Mill Group

Edinburgh Woollen Mill boss Philip Day usually shuns attention, but he was forced into the media spotlight when almost a year ago he acquired collapsed fashion retailer Peacocks out of administration, rescuing a well-liked brand and saving 6,000 jobs.

Eleven months into the turnaround, Day says Peacocks is debt free.

He says: “We’ve developed the products for the future. We’ve realigned the demographic with beautiful basics and we’ve added value, using the best raw materials. The customer has loved it and they have come back in volume.”

In the year since Peacocks hit the wall, the economy has continued to wreak havoc on the retail sector. The headline-grabbing collapses of Blockbuster, HMV and Jessops this month provided a stark reminder of the difficult reality retailers face.

But Peacocks has so far been a good news story, and Day is hopeful for his peers that offer consumers a compelling reason to shop with them.

“I am very positive about the retail sector. I believe that if you produce an excellent product, you will have a robust business where the customer wants to shop,” he says.

The 47 year old says he has moved Peacocks away from fast fashion, lowered prices and reduced promotions.

As a result, the volume of markdowns is down by 50%.

“The first price is the right price,” he adds. “The core price stays the same all the time and it has worked phenomenally well. We have concentrated on getting the business built for the long term rather than the short term.”

Day bought the business and 388 stores out of administration last February, as 224 stores were forced to close.

Immediately Day invested £50m into Peacocks and he has vowed to restore it to 600 stores. Day has since increased the portfolio to more than 450 stores and is eyeing another 35.

The entrepreneur is also looking beyond the UK for expansion. He is eyeing up to 200 international stores, initially looking at Germany, the Middle East and Russia.

As well as store expansion, the online offer has improved after a website relaunch prior to Christmas. The site is generating the same number of hits it was before Peacocks went bust, and basket size has grown from £30 to £42.

It is a far cry from the Peacocks that collapsed under a mountain of debt. “Before, everyone was living under a mushroom of debt and the balance sheet was shot to pieces,” Day says.

“Now we’ve bought the head office building in Cardiff, we’ve got a fantastically positive balance sheet and we’re investing in people, stock and the future. We’ve streamlined departments too and put money into stores. The teams in our shops have been utterly fantastic.”

Peacocks hasn’t been Day’s only rescue project. He acquired 33 of Jane Norman’s 94 stores out ofadministration in June 2011. But while Day’s passion for that brand is clear, it has proven to be a challenge. “It is fast fashion,” he says. “We’ve tried to keep all the wheels turning at the same time. It has been hard work, fun, interesting, exacting and difficult.”

He admits more work is needed and is now reviewing all stores, and plans to refit the main London shops next year.

Day refers to Jane Norman as Edinburgh Woollen Mill’s “international designer brand” and plans to open stores in China, Korea and Japan within five years.

“Slowly but surely, we will roll it out. We see it as a 10 to 15-year project, showcasing it as a quintessentially British brand,” he says.

Trading at Edinburgh Woollen Mill’s core eponymous knitwear business has been “phenomenal” says Day, and he is targeting up to 800 stores for the retailer, which had 463 at its year-end in February 2012.

With his growing empire, it seems that Day looks as if he will be in the business media glare for some time yet.