Shares in the company fell to 90 pence, its lowest in a year, in early trade on Monday on the London Stock Exchange.

UK commercial sales, which account for about 40 percent of overall sales, declined 16.4 percent, the company said.

The company, which has been shutting down high street stores to focus on its online business, closed 12 during the year, bringing down the number of own stores to 249.

Thorntons, which sells its products in its own stores as well as to supermarkets, said like-for-like sales in the retail division fell 3.7 percent.

"As we had anticipated, this (Q1) has shown a revenue decline from both the retail and FMCG, with the timing of orders from the grocery channel affecting the latter," Investec Securities analyst Nicola Mallard said in a note.

The brokerage has a "buy" rating on the stock with a target of 175 pence.

Thorntons' shares were trading down 5.6 percent at 93.55 pence at 0728 GMT (08:28 a.m. BST).

(Reporting by Aastha Agnihotri in Bangalore; Editing by Sunil Nair)