JoJo Maman Bebe hikes prices
JoJo Maman Bebe hikes prices for first time in 5 years due to widespread supply chain challenges
JoJo Maman Bébé is best known for its French-style children’s clothing – a favourite brand of Royals and recently worn by Princess Charlotte when she applauded NHS carers – but it has seen a spike in demand for its pregnancy products in the past few weeks.
The baby clothing and goods retailer said it had seen shipping costs quadruple in recent months. Its commercial director, Gwynn Milligan, said: “We’ve had no choice but to pass on some of these costs to our customers.”
Ms Milligan, commercial director told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that the firm had seen increases in the cost of raw materials such as wood, paper and plastics, for example, which may affect items such as its toys or changing mats.
She added that the company was also having to absorb increased costs on some products, because of competition from retail rivals. Price hikes will not be uniform across the board, but will depend on each item and what it is made up of.
“We’ve looked at prices across our competitors and also what customers realistically want to pay. There’s no set increase in any area, but it depends on what we’ve looked at and what’s going on in that sector.”
While the retailer does not believe that price increases will be sustained, it did point to problems with deliveries too – largely down to a shortage of lorry drivers at ports and difficulties in obtaining shipping containers.
Ms Milligan said: “We’re advising customers not to panic because we’ve increased our orders to deal with the ever-growing demand of JoJo.”
Customers have already starting planning their Christmas buys, according to the retailer. The term “Christmas” was the third-highest search on its website last week, and it believes that spending will be higher due to lockdown restrictions hampering festive plans for many people in the UK last December.
The news comes as the British Retail Consortium (BRC) warned that price increases could last into the winter months. While overall retail prices fell 0.8% year-on-year, Helen Dickinson, chief executive of the BRC, said: “There are some modest indications that rising costs are starting to filter through into product prices.”
She warned: “Low prices are already under threat, and now the HGV driver shortage has created an additional problem with a shortfall of 90,000 drivers.”
[Image source: Thank you to businesssupport.blog.gov.uk]
