Tonight:
9°c
As sponsor of the Chelsea Flower Show, which opens next Tuesday, paving stones and paviors group Marshalls was keen to get today's £34 million rights issue out in the market this week.
There's nothing worse than being interrupted over your glass of Pimm's while you are admiring the new range of drought-resistant pelargoniums by a pension fund manager wanting to discuss your "theoretical ex-rights price".
Marshalls is raising £34 million on a two new shares-for-five old ones basis at 65p a share. That will cut debt, which stands at £135 million, and according to chief executive Graham Holden "gives greater flexibility and improves headroom on our financial covenants".
Marshalls has sponsored Chelsea for the past three years, moving in when financial services giants like Merrill Lynch and Saga took their funds away. Holden says he can't say how much it costs "for contractual" reasons and will not sit down with the Royal Horticultural Society to discuss future deals until this year's show is finished.
But he's not worried about the likelihood of exhibitor and visitor numbers being down as the recession bites even gardeners.
This year's Marshalls garden "Living Street" is aimed very much at its biggest market of town planners and designers with what Holden calls "its uncluttered and fit-for-purpose urban look".
