Cotton Traders defies high street downturn with new stores as owner nears $1.6bn float
Cotton Traders has opened a slew of new stores as the former catalogue business continues to weather the challenging environment faced by high street retailers, according to newly-filed documents.
The company, which was founded by former England national rugby union team captains Fran Cotton and Steve Smith in the late 1980s, opened 10 new stores last year, bringing its total brick and mortar portfolio to 87 sites.
Cotton Traders said it had “carefully considered” the locations of its new shops to ensure they were in “accessible areas” so that it could reach more customers with its click-and-collect service.
The Cheshire-headquartered retailer also refurbished 12 of its existing stores with new digital cash registers.
But despite increasing its store footprint the company saw its turnover dip slightly to £109m during the 12 months, down from £111m in the year before.
Its pre-tax profit also went down, hitting £8.4m from £10.3m in the prior year.
In a statement published to Companies House Cotton Traders said that the decrease was “mainly due to one less week’s trading compared to the previous 53 week year”.
Who owns Cotton Traders?
Cotton Traders is owned by CorpAcq, a company founded by the brother of former Take That singer Jason Orange, Simon Orange.
In 2023 the company revealed plans to transfer its listing from the London to the New York Stock Exchange as part a $1.6bn takeover by Churchill VII – a special purpose investment vehicle set up as a trust account by New York corporate financier Michael Klein.
After several stop starts which delayed the deal by more than six months, a new filing with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission last month revealed that a date of July 25 had been selected for a vote of Churchill Capital Corp VII’s shareholders regarding the deal.
If backed, the merger is expected to be completed shortly afterwards.
CorpAcq has more than 40 portfolio businesses including the likes of Cotton Traders, Aintree Plastics and Metcalfe Plant Hire.
As well as being the founder and chairman of Corpacq, Simon Orange is also the co-owner of Premiership rugby club Sale Sharks.