Body Shop International has suffered a drop in sales despite recruiting a new management team and axing 116 jobs earlier in the year.

Sales for the Littlehampton-based toiletries and make-up company fell by three per cent in the UK in the six months leading up to August, pushing the group £700,000 into the red.

Bosses at the company, which is famous for its environmentally-friendly stance, say the figures include the "high costs" of making people redundant and the major restructuring programme.

The company insisted there had been a positive leap of three per cent in sales in the last five weeks compared to this time last year.

However, this figure is distorted by the impact of the September 11 terrorist attacks.

Bill Ayres, head of corporate affairs, said "The redundancies were made in April as a result of reorganisation initiated by Peter Saunders and Adrian Bellamy, who took over the front seat of the company from co-founders Anita and Gordon Roddick in February.

"The drop in sales reflect the exceptionally high costs of these redundancies.

"The signs are now very encouraging and the launch of the new range of make-up has been successful."

Mr Ayres said the group had been hit by tougher trading conditions in Europe and the US.

In April this year, the Body Shop announced it was cutting 116 jobs, more than half of which were in the UK, including some in its international offices in Littlehampton and London.

Chief executive Peter Saunders said: "We continue to believe there will be an improvement in performance over last year."