Shares in home furnishing specialists Dunelm soared on Thursday morning following a trading statement in which the company said they were expecting higher profits.

Dunelm shares were trading up by as much as 17 per cent in early trading following the announcement made prior to the start of trading.

The announcement to the Stock Exchange said that the group were anticipating profits to be "higher than our previous expectations" following a successful overhaul of its digital offering.

The statement said: "Dunelm Group plc the UK's leading homewares retailer, is pleased to confirm that we have successfully transitioned all of our customers to our new digital platform.

"We now have a modern, flexible, cloud-native platform that will be used to accelerate the development of our customer proposition.

"Customers have responded well to the new website and we are delighted that during this critical transition period we did not see any adverse impact to our performance, maintaining our strong sales growth both online and in stores.

"Gross margins have been stronger than expected as a result of sourcing gains and better sell through. Operational costs remain well controlled and in line with our expectations.

"In light of the above, the Board now anticipates that the full year profit before tax will be higher than our previous expectations, assuming no significant change in consumer demand as a result of the outcome of the general election."

The latest announcement comes just over a month after an October update that warned of struggling sales and possible harm to profits.

Dunelm posted pre-tax profits of £125.9 million for the year to June 29, 2019 following record revenues of £1.1billion.

Dunelm have stores on Gloucester's Westgate Retail Park and on Centrum Park in Cheltenham.