John Lewis has reported a 99% fall in profit for the first half of its financial year after it spent the period competing with rivals offering multiple discounting days.
The company, which includes supermarket chain Waitrose, also warned that it expected its full-year profits would be “substantially lower” than 2017.
Profit before tax and exceptional items fell to £1.2m in the six months ended 28 July 2018, compared with £22.2m for the same period last year.
Sir Charlie Mayfield, chairman of the John Lewis Partnership, said the period had been the “most promotional market we’ve seen in almost a decade” in what were “challenging times” for the retail market.
He added that the retailer had also been hit by additional costs from greater expenditure on cybersecurity and data protection.
Despite the dip in profits, John Lewis said it planned to maintain its investment rate of £400m to £500m per year.
The John Lewis Partnership also reported net debt of £404m, £17m down on the first half of 2017, while net cash and equivalents stood at just over £370m. It also posted a slight increase in gross sales to £5.5bn, up from £5.4bn last year.
The firm has also said it had halved its accounting pension deficit to £171.3 since January.
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