US giant Manpower has seen its shares reach a record high in recent days, but the UK is still a blot on its landscape.

Manpower reported record first-quarter revenue of $3.9bn (£2.19bn), up 5% on a year ago. Operating profit was $60m, also up 5%.
“It’s the first quarter where we’ve really fired on all cylinders,” chairman, chief executive and president Jeff Joerres told analysts in a conference call. The UK was the only one of its major regions to report a decline compared with the previous year. Sales were down 12% in sterling terms, at about £125m.

The company took a charge of $8m for UK restructuring and office closure costs. Although it has closed some UK offices, the company said it has opened others here and it was taking on staff in some regions. It declined to be specific on numbers.
Joerres said it was much easier to close offices and shed staff in the UK than it is in France. 

He added that “pricing actions” – referring to Manpower aiming to maintain high margins – meant the company had lost some customers in the UK. “We might have to get a bit smaller in the top line,” he said. It would take several months to get the UK operation back to where it was last year.

Manpower has about 300 offices in the UK, where it also owns the Brook Street chain, which has 127 branches. In 2004, it opened a London branch of Jefferson Wells, which specialises in providing audit and accountancy staff. Joerres said this had performed well, having been boosted by the need for firms to cope with the demands of Sarbanes-Oxley, US accounting regulations requiring more and better quality financial information.

Revenue in France, its biggest market, rose 10% to $1.3bn. This compares with $510m in the US, up 7%. Analysts at Merrill Lynch forecast Manpower’s revenue will top $17.3bn in 2006, and will reach more than $20bn by 2008.