Marshalls plc, the Elland, West Yorkshire-based stone and landscaping firm, said it has made an encouraging start to 2025 with a return to group revenue growth in the first four months of the year and improving trends in all its reporting segments.
In an AGM trading update for the four months to April 30, 2025, Marshalls said it delivered revenue of £207 million (2024: £199 million), marking a return to growth and a year-on-year increase of 4%.
“Landscaping Products revenue contracted by three per cent year-on-year to £86 million (2024: £89 million), which is a significant improvement over the 11 per cent reduction reported in the second half of 2024,” saif the firm.
“This performance is encouraging in the context of subdued end markets and reflects the impact of the comprehensive performance improvement plan that was initiated in June 2024.
“The improving trend was evident in both our stockist and direct to site revenues, driven by strengthened customer relationships. We remain confident of achieving revenue and market share growth for Landscaping Products in 2025 and are further encouraged by the ongoing improvements in our order intake.
“Building Products revenue grew by four per cent to £56 million (2024: £54 million). This growth reflects a strong performance in our Water Management and Mortars business units driven respectively by good commercial execution and moderate improvements in build rates on housing developments which favours ready-to-use mortars.
“In Bricks we continued to see growth in facing bricks although overall revenue was impacted by softer demand for other products in a competitive marketplace. The Aggregates business unit was impacted by softer demand and reported lower revenues year-on-year.
“Roofing revenue increased by 15 per cent to £65 million (2024: £56 million). This growth was driven by the continued strong performance of Viridian Solar, which benefitted from house builders choosing its market-leading integrated solar proposition in response to changes in building regulations.
“Marley Roofing also delivered sustained revenue growth, primarily through timber battens and clay tiles, with the latter benefitting from the launch of a new product range.”
In its outlook, Marshalls said: “The Board is encouraged as we begin to see results from our performance improvement plans in Landscaping and growth across our other businesses despite markets remaining subdued.
“The Group remains well placed to benefit as key end markets recover. Against this backdrop, the Board’s expectations for 2025 remain unchanged.”
Marshalls plc CEO Matt Pullen said: “We have made an encouraging start to 2025 with a return to Group revenue growth in the first four months of the year and improving trends in all our reporting segments.
“We remain focused on executing our performance improvement plan in Landscaping alongside deploying our Transform & Grow’ strategy at pace and are well positioned to respond swiftly to improving activity levels when our key end markets recover.”