Jessops said it had acquired 20 stores in Scotland and Northern Ireland, boosting its total outlets to 313.

The acquisition is part of Jessops' ongoing store opening plan and is therefore already factored into forward forecasts, the company said in a statement on Wednesday.

All 104 employees at MacKinnons of Dyce Ltd will be transferred to Jessops and the acquired assets, for which it is paying 815,000 pounds in cash, will be converted to the Jessops facia and Spacemix format in the next six weeks.

Last week, Jessops, the country's biggest specialist photographic retailer, had said the camera and developing and processing market had been soft in the past two months, hitting like for like sales.

For the 51 weeks to September 24, like for like sales were up 2.9 percent compared with 3.6 percent in the first half with total sales up 6.5 percent.

Shares in Jessops were unchanged at 125 1/2 pence by 9:15 a.m., valuing the firm at around 129 million pounds.

United kingdom