Silverwood Brands issues ‘bumpy ride’ warning as Lush exit completes

Silverwood Brands has warned its financial figures will reveal it experienced a “bumpy ride” during 2023 as it completed its exit from Lush.

The London-headquartered company added that while its underlying brands “performed in line with our expectations”, it does not anticipate a “simple tidy linear pattern when growing these smaller brands”.

However the business said that over the longer term it expects a “picture of profitable growth”.

Silverwood Brands includes the likes of Almonds, Nailberry and Sonotas.

The update, issued to the London Stock Exchange, comes after the company’s exit from its investment in Lush completed.

In February, Lush settled a legal dispute with former-CEO Andrew Gerrie over a blocked transfer of company shares.

The retailer had been in a row with Gerrie’s Silverwood Brands since December 2022, when the business sought to acquire a 19.8 per cent stake in Lush from the ex-boss and his wife, Alison Hawksley.

At the time, it was reported that the shares were worth around £216.8m.

In its latest update to the London Stock Exchange, Silverwood Brands said: “As noted in previous announcements about this transaction, we were very disappointed with the reaction of the Lush management team to our position, and we have taken the pragmatic approach of withdrawing from the acquisition due to the aggressive stance adopted by Lush. Our previous announcements covered the details of this.

“We have now effected an unwinding of the transaction via a capital reduction which was approved by the court on 16 April 2024 and completed on 30 April 2024.

“The attempted transaction consumed a huge amount of management time and focus, along with associated costs.

“Much of this fee cost was reimbursed by Andrew Gerrie and Alison Hawksley. We now wish them good luck in their endeavours to achieve a sale of their Lush shares.”