You are viewing your 1 free article this month. Login to read more articles.
A demerger of W H Smith's high street stores and its travel branches is unlikely in the near term, but not impossible to imagine in the future, W H Smith chief executive Kate Swann has told the Telegraph, in a rare interview.
The travel stores have been the power-house of WHS since Swann joined in 2003, with its operating profits now above those reported by its sister chain. On a possible demerger, Swann said: "It's not a plan right now, [but] if we thought it was value enhancing than that would be fine," she says. "We're in the fortunate position that commercially it actually makes sense to keep the businesses separate. They operate in different ways and buy different products."
Swann told the newspaper she would consider a split if the businesses grew to be so completely different (because of international growth, for example), or if it was difficult for the businesses to be valued appropriately as one entity.
In the UK, Swann expects to add up to 20 sites a year in the travel business and 10 to 20 on the high street.
On a possible move to larger business, Swann said: "If you can make a difference and create value then it doesn't make a difference whether you're at a big or a small company ‚ and there's definitely upside in having to do less ribbon cutting." And added: "I think one could hypothesise that women generally have smaller egos and therefore the size of the company is less important."