Cath Kidston looking to bag Spanish market

Her designs are as English as marmalade on toast with a mug of hot piping tea. But despite representing a fair chunk of the UK’s creative high street output over the past few years, Cath Kidston has set her sights on Continental Europe – with Spain first in the crosshairs…

If you don’t know Cath Kidston, then you must have been hiding under a particularly grey rock these past years. The company sells home furnishings and related goods via its 61 British and 58 international – mostly Asian – stores. Valued at £75m (€78m), Cath Kidston’s designs are noted for their bright use of primary and pastel colours and distinctive, nostalgic floral patterns.

Benefiting from a serendipitous capture of fashion’s appetite for all things comforting and decidedly British in the wake of the economic downturn (think ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ in bag form with added splodges of Middle England sensibilities and you’re not far off), Cath Kidston’s fortunes have been transformed in the past five years, with her distinctive stores a visible presence on most mid-market high streets throughout the UK.

The Cath Kidston Group tentatively tested the waters of the Spanish market before Christmas last year when they launched a limited range of items at El Corte Inglés stores in Madrid and Majorca. The Madrid concessions have now become permanent and the company’s chief executive, Kenny Wilson, is currently in talks with El Corte Inglés to get their goods distributed at stores throughout Spain.

“The owners of El Corte Inglés in Spain approached us and said they’d seen our brand in Selfridges in London and thought it works brilliantly in a shop-in-shop department store format,” said Wilson.

“‘They wanted to try it in Spain so we’ve done a test in Madrid in the number one El Corte Inglés store. It’s been very, very successful… Clearly, if we can make the brand work in a pretty tough Spanish economy that gives us confidence that it can work across Western Europe.”