Focus sells six stores to Asda

The British DIY chain Focus this week agreed the sale of six of its outlets to the Walmart subsidiary Asda. The stores will become part of Asda’s supermarket division, which brings together all of its smaller-format stores. The deal will bring urgently needed funds to Focus, which narrowly escaped going into administration in 2009 thanks to the company voluntary agreements it entered into with its landlords. Its parent company FLP2 reported a pre-tax loss of £21 million in the financial year ending in February 2010, which it described as a year characterised by “a challenging trading environment”.