Tough times have continued at houseware and industrial products maker Metalrax which posted a profits warning yesterday.
The firm, which employs 1,500 in the Midlands, said the continued decline in retail footfall had accelerated - hitting its sales during what is normally one of its peak times of the year.
Metalrax, which first highlighted the trend at its interim results in September, said it now expected the outcome for the whole year to be " signficantly below market expectations".
A consensus of analysts had forecast profits before tax of £9.3 million, a figure which has now been revised to £6.7 million.
In the six months to the end of June pretax profis fell from £4.7 million to £3.97 million.
But on a brighter note, chief executive Richard Arbuthnot said trading within the engineering and storage division had been resilient.
He added the implementation of the strategic review and consolidation of operations within both divisions has mitigated some, but not all, of the adverse impact from houseware's volume and margin decline.
The initiatives generated by the strategic review of the group's businesses have been implemented progressively throughout the current year and the benefits should be seen in 2006.
The losses incurred in the housewares injection moulding operation have been eliminated by the disposal of the MRX Plastic Moulding business to an managment buyout.
He said the previously announced closure and the cessation of under-performing housewares operations had been achieved on time and to budget.
