A Bury St Edmunds plumbing company is set to close as part of a “transformation plan” by its owners.

City Plumbing Supplies, based at the Lark Valley Business Park, is owned by builders’ merchants Travis Perkins – which is planning to close a number of its plumbing stores across the UK.

Travis Perkins says the closures are part of a strategic review of its “underperforming” plumbing and heating division, which includes PTS and City Plumbing Supplies.

The company, which has its head office in Northampton, has spoken to employees affected by the closures and is “working closely with them to find alternative roles across the group.”

It is unknown how many jobs will be lost at the Bury St Edmunds branch.

Travis Perkins’ interim report up to June 30 said: “The plumbing and heating division has underperformed in recent years, with weakening sales and reducing profitability.

“Both the contract and local installer markets have been increasingly competitive, with the traditional national plumbing merchants under pressure from the significant expansion of online and fixed price multichannel operators and strong local and regional independents.”

City Plumbing Supplies became part of the Travis Perkins group in 2002, and has a nationwide network of more than 300 branches.

A Travis Perkins spokesman said: “We are always looking to improve the way our business operates, taking an innovative approach and offering a wide range of products that meet our customer need.

“We recognise this is a challenging market and we need to continuously adapt our business model to ensure our branches are as best placed as possible to perform successfully.

“As a result, we see opportunities to open new branches in locations where our customers are not well served, relocate branches to better sites and close a number of branches.

“We have spoken to all of our teams who have been affected by these changes as we establish the best branch network to serve all of our customers and are working closely with them to find alternative roles across the group.

“All of these changes are designed to help us serve our customers better and get the business back to growth.”