US-owned retailer Whole Foods is reportedly still struggling to turn a profit in the UK, where it currently operates a total of six stores and from where it had originally planned to expand into Europe.

According to The Grocer, the company's British business has reported a loss of £4.4m (€5.5m) for the year to 25 September, five years after it opened its first UK-based Whole Foods Market outlet in the upmarket London borough of Kensington.

That result compared poorly with a £3.1m (€3.9m) loss in the same period 2010, although figures available at Companies House suggest sales improved by 9 per cent year on year to £50.6m (€63m).

Whole Foods is understood to have three more UK stores in development, due to open in 2013 at the earliest.