Boden back on board after “mistakes”

JOHNNIE BODEN admitted to being “a complete nitwit” by attempting to make the classic brand over-trendy.

“We forgot who we were,” he admitted to The Times after the company recorded a  2022 pre-tax loss of £4.4 million (€5.1 million), compared to a £22 million (€25.5 million) profit in 2021.

Sales fell 2 per cent to £350 million (€406.7 million) during this period, while the number of Boden customers slid by 5 per cent to 1.8 million.

He has pledged to revamp the business after a “series of mistakes” that brought significant losses.

“We changed the product too much,” Boden said. “We had less colour, we had shorter silhouettes and we had the sorts of products that were on trend, which is not very us.”

Eton-educated Boden, who studied Politics, Philosophy and Economics at Oxford. launched the mail order business in the early 1990s although he admitted in a 2014 BBC interview that his first attempts were “clearly pretty amateurish.”

This was the same year that he entered the Rich List with a £300 million (€348.8 million).

Boden also revealed to The Times that he intends to send out apologetic emails telling customers, “Sorry, I effed up.”

Britain’s former PM David Cameron embodied “Boden Man” in the company’s floral swimming trunks, although the menswear line has been temporarily axed.

Women customers, who have included the Princess of Wales, have been promised that the label will no longer attempt to be “too young.  The printed catalogue will also continue to be available after earlier cutbacks, Boden said.

The decision to cut back on the retailer’s popular catalogue had been a huge error, Boden confessed.

“We knew that we had to reduce distribution because digital was the future, but we cut back too much.”

Boden also said that he was “pretty confident” the company would get back on its feet.

“These things happen. Look at Apple — that almost went bust. James Dyson and his electric car, that didn’t work. Gucci was once on its knees,” he pointed out.