Sosandar shares fall 16% amid £5.4m placing

Sosandar Co-CEOs Ali Hall and Julie Lavington

Shares of Wilmslow-based fashion firm Sosandar plc were down about 16% on Wednesday afternoon as it announced it has conditionally raised gross proceeds of £5.4 million via a share placing with existing and new investors.

A total of 24,545,454 shares were placed at 22p per share — a discount of 17% to the closing mid-price of the firm’s ordinary dhares onTuesday.

Sosandar Co-CEOs Ali Hall and Julie Lavington said: “We are delighted to have successfully completed our placing, with both existing and new investors showing support for our business and future growth plans.

“We welcome the strength of support shown by our existing shareholders and would like to welcome new investors to the company.

“The progress and momentum that we have experienced over the last two years has been substantial.

“The strength of our brand and distinctive product range continues to resonate incredibly well with our large but underserved demographic and with this strong momentum, the board believes the opportunity for Sosandar is larger than ever.

“This opportunity has been demonstrated by us delivering a record performance in the third quarter of FY23 with a record number of visits to Sosandar.com and a record quarter for our third party partners.

“We see a number of opportunities for further growth both on our own site and through our third party partners in the coming months and beyond.

“Proceeds of the placing will provide the balance sheet flexibility to enable us to execute our omni-channel strategy, starting with increasing stock from Autumn Winter 2023 for the in-store launch with Sainsbury’s, fast-tracking other growth initiatives and accelerating our proven customer acquisition model.

“Our decision to become an omni-channel business will allow us to enhance our brand equity, accelerate market share growth both in the UK and internationally while also increasing both brand awareness and scalable growth potential.

“We are as confident as ever that the winning formula of our distinctive product range and effective marketing strategy will enable us to capitalise on the sizable opportunity available and continue to move forward on our journey to becoming one of the largest womenswear brands globally.”