Good morning, everybody, and thanks for joining us this morning. What I'd like to do is start with a few financial highlights. As you can see, for the group in quarter three, turnover was just over EUR 1.2 billion. In terms of revenue growth year-on-year constant currency, that's a growth of 17.1%, and the like-for-like growth for the group, 4.9%. Just breaking that down slightly, that's Pepco at 7.3%, and a very solid performance from Poundland in the tough market conditions of 2% positive like-for-like. I think these figures are testament that discounters can be resilient in tough times, in tough market conditions. What I'd like to do is give you an update on a few of our strategic priorities. Essentially, how are we getting bigger and how are we getting better?
In terms of bigger, this is a key deliverable for the group, and it's essentially around our new store openings program. The good news is we've ended up at the end of quarter three with 3,795 stores, and that's a new stores year to date growth of 350 stores. However, that does exclude some of the Fultons closures that we've made in the quarter. In terms of the new stores year -to -date growth, that's 10.2% growth. Just breaking that down a little bit more, in terms of Pepco, we've opened a further 109 stores in quarter three, so that's now a year to date total of 311. Just for information, 40% of those in quarter three were in Western Europe and just one other piece of information, we've now opened up our second store in Germany.
Now let me move on to how are we getting better as a business. Essentially, I'm going to update you on two programs. The first program is our continued store renewals program, which is essentially our refits in Poundland and our refits in Pepco. In quarter three, we've refitted a further 82 stores in the quarter, and that brings a total of 668 renewals year to date. All of this is helping us drive like-for-like. Just for your information, we've done a little review just to see how customers are responding to these refits as the market gets tougher, and the good news is the customers are responding in almost exactly the same way pre the tough times. We're confident that these store renewal programs are still very much in favor for the customer.
The second program I'd like to update you on in terms of getting better is update you on our way forward in Spain. In half one, I said that I think the business is very good at optimizing each of the OpCo, and that working previously with Andy, the CEO when I was the COO, we started to look at how we could optimize not just the OpCo, but also the group. In Spain, we've been operating with two formats, Dealz formats, which we got 59 stores in, and we started that format seven years ago, and we entered as Pepco a year ago, and we've now got 54 stores. We've been operating on two formats. We've been conducting a review. I said that I would do a review of how we could optimize the group, and we've concluded our review of Spain.
We've been doing some trials since March. What have we done? We've taken six existing Dealz stores and we've refitted them to the Pepco new look and feel, and we've put in a full Pepco GM offer into the store and a full Pepco clothing offer. The reason why I mention full is that because of Pepco's superior infrastructure, what we're able to do is hold far less stock in the warehouse, which has meant that we've been able to reduce the warehouse by about 50% and make the shop floor bigger by using the warehouse space. That has allowed us to give a full offering on clothing and a full offering on GM. We've also kept the same FMCG offer, which Dealz has operated with, which is essentially FMCG non-food and FMCG grocery.
In effect, what we've done is we've taken the best of Dealz, the FMCG offer, and the best of Pepco, which is the clothing and GM offer, and put it into one store. The good news is there's been a significant customer response and a significant improvement of the financial performance. Because of this, we've now concluded our trials. We have decided to go forward with a different way in our Spain business. We will be going forward with our opening program with both the Pepco standalone stores, as hopefully you know and love, but also a Pepco with a full GM, full clothing, as well as an FMCG offer. We will open where it fits either a standalone or a Pepco with FMCG where it's applicable. Essentially, as I said, getting the best of Dealz and the best of Pepco.
We intend to refit each and every one of the Dealz stores into a Pepco over the next year to 18 months. Okay, that concludes how are we getting bigger. Just to remind you, we are on track to deliver over 400 new openings in Pepco for this full year. It also concludes how we're getting better, which is essentially our stores renewal program, which is helping like-for-like, but also, as I've just mentioned, how we're getting better with a new blended format of Pepco in Spain and Pepco FMCG in Spain. Finally, to close from me, despite tough market conditions, we remain on track to deliver our full year guidance, and I think this is real testament to our continued focus on getting simpler, getting cheaper in everything that we do. Happy to open up for questions.
Thank you. If you wish to ask one at this time, please press star one on your telephone keypad. Please ensure the mute function on your telephone is switched off to allow your signal to reach our equipment. Again, please press star one to ask a question. We will now take our first question from James Anstead from Barclays. Please go ahead.
Good morning, Trevor. I've got three questions on the Spanish updates. The first one would be, these new hybrid Pepco stores, will they be branded at all differently to the standard Pepco stores or totally the same branding from the outside? I suppose the second one would be, is the financial performance of these new stores so good that you'd be actively looking for bigger locations in Spain, or is this just when you get a site that's slightly bigger than typical you can deploy it when necessary, or is it so good that you'd really actively look for them? I suppose the final question would be, is this perhaps an interesting opportunity that you'd start to consider adding in a bit more FMCG to the Pepco stores in countries other than Spain?
Myself and Mat will answer that together. The first question in terms of what will be the logo. We've done some sort of research, what we've concluded is that we just want to go with one simple brand, that will be the Pepco logo, and it's the new Pepco logo. We're very clear that it will be one logo. I think in truth, there'll be three types of stores. There'll be the Pepco standalone, which is the Pepco everyone knows. There will be the Pepco with the full FMCG offer, as well as the full GM and full clothing. Of course, there will be some stores that we can't quite get the size we need.
I think there will be some Pepcos where there will be the full GM, full clothing, and a sort of smaller version of the FMCG, which we haven't trialed yet, but we know that when we look at the size of the stores, a sort of mini hybrid offer of FMCG is also an opportunity. In terms of clarity, it will just be the Pepco logo. In terms of the sizes, we will just continue looking for the same sizes that Dealz looked for, knowing that we can get more out of the stores because of the infrastructure so we can go into the warehouses. The size that Dealz look for, the size that Pepco looks for currently remains the same. It's just that each and every one of those stores will be able to sort of tailor the offer absolutely to the size of the store.
The third question, over to Mat.
Just to build on that final point there, James, I think one of the things that the business of Pepco has always built itself on is this sort of cookie-cutter approach. What this means is that there are simply more sites that are now an opportunity to do the cookie-cutter because if there is a site that's slightly larger that works for us in terms of the customer location, we've got a format now and size of format that works. In terms of FMCG elsewhere, that's something we'll give more of an update on in October.
Certainly, as we begin to look at the balance of the Iberian Peninsula and Portugal, yes, that certainly will feature, but I think in terms of the balance of the estate, that's something we'll give a little bit more detail on as we get into our capital markets update in October.
That's very helpful. I'll let someone else have a chance at some questions, but thank you.
Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, please press star one. We'll pause for a moment to allow everyone to signal. We will now take our next question from Simon Bowler from Numis. Please go ahead.
Morning. Actually, just something of a reminder. Can you just remind how the kind of logistics and supply chain in Spain works between kind of the Dealz and the Pepco formats and whether there's anything that's kind of changing there as you combine those formats together from a logistics supply chain perspective?
Yeah, okay. Let me answer this one. If you look at the current Dealz, they currently sell the PEP&CO GM range from Poundland and the PEP&CO clothing range from Poundland. Those products come through from the U.K. into Europe through all the Brexit stuff, pay duty, and then get shipped down to the Madrid DC, and then they get put away and then picked by store. Going forward, what will happen is the products from Pepco will come from Győr for about a year, just over a year. That's Győr in Hungary. The products will be picked by store in the DC and will go straight to the DC in Madrid and will be flowed through directly to the stores. It's a far simpler process of moving clothing in GM, and it's actually a far cheaper process of moving the products as well, especially when you consider duty.
Okay, great. Thank you.
There are no further questions in the queue at this time.
James or Simon, if you've got any further questions, feel free to ask away if no one else does.
We will now take a follow-up question from Simon Bowler from Numis. Please go ahead, sir.
Yeah, thanks. I'll just come back in. Just in terms of trying to understand, I guess what's happened on the trajectory of the three-year like-for-likes. I think as last reported, you've spoken to an eight-week period with Pepco trading close to 14% and Poundland Dealz at around about 4%, and then for a separate trading period this morning you've spoken to Pepco around about 9% and Poundland Dealz closer to 6%. Just how comparable are those two numbers, and is there anything with regard to the trajectory between the two of them that we should be reading something into?
It's a good question, Simon. I think the reality is, at this stage, wouldn't read too much into that. I think directionally they're both similar in that Poundland touched along a single-digit LFL and Pepco close to double-digit. I think that the period that we described at H1 was sort of eight weeks immediately following COVID restrictions easing. Clearly, sometimes in that base it's not always clear precisely some of the consumer trading dynamics. Maybe there was a touch of rebounding those opening few weeks that has impacted the number. I think this is the first time that we've reported a full quarter in the current financial year without restrictions, and we'll continue to do so. I don't think at this stage there's a huge amount to read into that.
Certainly when I think about the absolute performance, both at what we've reported for the period, but also on an average weekly sales basis that we use to calculate this, still gives us confidence in terms of the trajectory of the business. Certainly, I think the revenue that we've reported, both in terms of growth and absolute in both businesses is still, A, resilient, and B, broadly in line with where we expected it to be and probably the market.
Okay, great. Within the U.K., the-- Oh, sorry. Can you still hear me?
Yep.
Yep. Okay, cool. Just within the U.K., the Fultons banner, where there's been some further closures in 3Q, can you just give a quick update how far through that closure program are we? Is that all largely complete now? Any sense of the revenue contribution? I believe certainly in the first half those stores were negative contribution. Is that fair to say of the ongoing closures within that part of the business?
Correct it is. Yeah, I think there might be a couple more in the final quarter to come, but the vast majority now have been closed in this period. I think from certainly into next financial year, we'll be operating from a clean base because appreciate it's not been hugely helpful dealing with that program whilst we've been describing the bigger store opening programs that we're doing. A couple more to come in Q4, but the majority, the 59 that we've done to date, are the majority that we'll be dealing with.
Great. Thank you.
As there are no further questions at this time, I'd like to turn the call back to your speakers for any additional or closing remarks.
Thank you very much for joining us today. Hopefully, you found the summary useful, and thank you for the questions. Anything from yourself, Mat?
No. If there are any questions from either analysts or investors, please feel free to get in touch with Lucy or I to cover anything further. Thank you.