The Hut Group secures fresh funds as sales pass £1bn mark

By

Barbara Santamaria

Published
Nov 21, 2019

Britain’s Hut Group has grown remarkably fast over the past decade, and it hopes the launch of two new debt facilities will give it the further boost it needs to become the global leader in online beauty.

The Manchester-based company announced on Thursday it has launched its first Term Loan B (TLB) debt, raising £510m with a seven-year maturity. Additionally, it received a five-year £150m revolving credit facility, which is fully underwritten by Barclays, HSBC, Citi and Santander.

The group, which is behind several beauty brands, a leading cosmetics e-tail site and proprietary e-commerce platform, described the deals as a “major step forward”.

The Hut Group has grown sales from £80m in 2010 to £916m in 2018 and “well in excess” of £1 billion this year. Two-thirds of revenues are generated outside the UK, particularly in Europe, Asia and the US. Driving this staggering growth is the firm’s unique business model, underpinned by its vertically integrated, technology-first consumer brand portfolio and a range of technology services.

The new funds will be used to further improve the different parts of the model. On the one hand is the portfolio of own brands, which currently generates more than 50% of sales. These include Myprotein and seven prestige beauty brands: Espa, Christophe Robin, Ameliorate, Grow Gorgeous, Mio Skincare, Illamasqua and Eyeko.

On the other hand is Ingenuity, an e-commerce and operating platform that rivals Salesforce, Magento and Shopify. Ingenuity is an ambitious service offering an end-to-end ecommerce solution across hosting, content creation, translation, more than 50 payment options, over 100 courier options, affiliate marketing networks, brand events, and manufacturing and distribution centres.

Consumer groups such as Nestle, P&G and J&J are powered by Ingenuity.

Commenting on the new loans, Matthew Moulding, founder and chief executive officer of THG, said: “This is another major step forward for THG and a testament to the strength of the business we have built. 

“These new debt facilities provide the company with significant investment capability enabling us to further drive our proposition across global markets, build brands of scale and continue to develop our leading technology, infrastructure and people.”