Christmas sales boost for Greene King
The cask ale brewer enjoyed Christmas Day sales of £2.7m, up 6.8 per cent, and sold 448,000 Christmas meals throughout December – two new records for Greene King.
“Our strong momentum has been maintained over the last six weeks,” said Greene King’s chief executive Rooney Anand. “We achieved record sales through Christmas and the New Year as our teams once again delivered excellent value, service and quality to our customers.
“Pubs continue to play a vital role for customers, families and communities across the UK during the festive period, especially in this difficult financial environment.
Food & rooms
We once again achieved record Christmas bookings and strong like-for-like sales growth across Christmas and the New Year.”
Like-for-like food sales were up 4.1 per cent across the group with room sales also performing well, up 4.6 per cent after the 36 weeks.
Greene King’s IPA and Old Speckled Hen beer brands were both ahead of last year on the back of our continued marketing investment and product innovation.
After 36 weeks, average EBITDA per pub was also up, by 4.2 per cent. Greene King’s disposal programme is on track with 65 non-core sites sold in the financial year to date.
Expectations met
Core own-brewed volume in Brewing & Brands was –2.0 per cent after 36 weeks, maintaining its outperformance against the UK ale market which is down 4.2 per cent.
Overall, Greene King’s financial update concludes: “our profit, cashflow and balance sheet remain in line with our expectations.”
Looking ahead to 2013, the statement adds: “We do not expect conditions for the UK consumer to improve in 2013.
“While this presents on-going challenges for all consumer-facing businesses, we are confident that our strategy, tailored to the prevailing conditions, and our consistent focus on providing excellent value, service and quality to our customers, will continue to deliver sustainable earnings and dividend growth to our shareholders.”
