New CEO vows to revive Warehouse brand with fun and fresh energy
Thursday, 2 October 2025
Despite The Warehouse group posting two years of losses and its share price sliding to a fresh low, newly-appointed chief executive Mark Stirton is confident the group can turn around its fortunes.
The Warehouse Group posted a $2.8 million loss in FY25, and a $54.2m loss in FY24, amid a battle to stay relevant in a challenging and ever-changing retail market and economy.
The owner of retail chains The Warehouse, Warehouse Stationery and Noel Leeming, which has a network of 216 stores, has revamped its management and leadership teams, and spent the past year changing its pricing and product assortments to better appeal to consumers.
Stirton told The Post the group’s stores had lost their fun and excitement and soon shoppers would begin to notice changes to fix that.
“With The Warehouse, particularly around major metropolitans, shoppers will see our key flagship stores start to look very different, with different signage and different colour and light - not major capex - but enough for the customer to notice something's changing.
“It'll come down to our writing and language in store; injecting a lot of fun. The way merchandise is put together on tables, the basics of visual merchandising, which we possibly haven't been as strong at. I think as we get that activated, people will start to fall in love with home and apparel.”
About 1.5 million people shop at The Warehouse every week.
The Warehouse Group made total sales of $3.1 billion in the year to August 3, up 1.6%.
Sales at the red shed The Warehouse increased 1.4% to $1.8b, Noel Leeming sales rose by 3.3% to $1b, while sales at Warehouse Stationery decreased by 2.5% to $226m.
Asked what his vision was for The Warehouse Group, Stirton said he was working on a detailed strategy for early next year, but he wanted to revamp the experience in stores to “deliver brands and experiences that customers love” - and target a younger spend-happy demographic of shoppers.
Part of that included “unlocking private label potential”, and working on and expanding different categories that it didn’t have a large market share such as sports and atheleisure apparel.
Kiwis were paying too much for goods in the fitness and athleisure categories, he said. “The home and apparel business and sports are elements that are really exciting for me.
“The health and beauty part of our business is key to unlocking that younger customer. I've got young daughters … and I know that when they see value in the beauty part of a business, they're in the store. If we can get them loving our beauty, home and personal care, and we've seen examples of that through Poppy and Daisy, they’ll cross-shop into our apparel, which we're doing a lot of work on to improve.”
Stirton said the main things he was orbiting around were: brand, culture and performance, with the first two having to work cohesively to get an applause-worthy performance.
As part of that he had been taking a close look at everything from business brand assets through to team uniforms and the way they engage on calls.
“We've got a bit stale, the fun and excitement has fallen out of our brand. We actually are quite an insurgent, little-bit-scrappy type of brand, and we've lost that in our personality, I want to bring it back,” he said.
“ I'm really passionate about people and culture, and so that's why I want to amplify our values and behaviours.”
Stirton believed The Warehouse was back on the right track and in a position where it could perform well when the economy and market improved.
“Some of our building blocks of retail are still in development and, as those become stronger, such as our merchandise, planning and buying, there's nice improvements we can make that will have multiplying effects across the business.
“You're starting to see fresh product in-store and the store experience starting to amplify. You're starting to see our visual merchandising standards [lifting].”
Stirton joined The Warehouse as chief financial officer in April 2024. Before that he was chief financial officer at general merchandise retailer Mr Price Group, based in South Africa and listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange.
For the past 16 months he had been assisting former interim CEO and incoming Warehouse chair John Journee to restructure the business under a brand led strategy.
Pre-Covid, The Warehouse’s stock was trading around $2.80 per share, it then shot up to $4 during the Covid sugar rush, and has since fallen 80%, trading at 80 cents on Thursday.
Stirton said he was confident he could turn around the business and create value for shareholders.
“What Mr. Price taught me is retail discipline, and retail discipline has fruit. When I came into this business, I realised it's lacked a little bit of the retail disciplines, and I think that's my strength … but it's going to be a tough journey. We're not out the woods yet.”
Outlook for the group
The first seven weeks of trading in the new financial year FY26 remained challenging, with sales and gross profit tracking to similar levels as last year, chairperson Joan Withers said during the company’s results announcement.
Low consumer confidence and ongoing cost-of-living pressures continued to affect household spending and, therefore, sales across the group.
The Warehouse said it would focus its effort and target growth in higher-margin categories including apparel, health and beauty, home, and toys.
“We are operating in a tough and unpredictable environment. While we are seeing early signs of improvement, we remain cautious about the pace of recovery. The Warehouse Group has taken the right steps to reset its foundations, and the Board is confident in the leadership and direction now in place,” Withers said.
This is Withers final results presentation for the group and she will finish her term as chair in November, after nine years with The Warehouse.