14th Sep 2018 08:07
LONDON (Alliance News) - JD Wetherspoon PLC on Friday reported growth in annual profit and said it has made a reasonable start to its new financial year, but taxes, labour, and interest costs are expected to be higher year-on-year.
For the 52 weeks to July 29, the pub chain recorded pretax profit of GBP107.2 million, up 4.3% year-on-year, with pretax profit rising 6.2% excluding an extra week in its prior financial year.
Revenue was GBP1.69 billion compared to GBP1.66 billion a year before. Like-for-like sales, adjusted for 52 weeks, increased by 5.0% versus 4.0% the year prior.
Wetherspoon's has retained its final dividend of 8.0 pence per share, giving an unchanged total dividend for the year of 12.0p.
Looking ahead, the company estimates it will be required to achieve like-for-like sales growth of about 4.0% in its new financial year to match Friday's profit figure. Same store sales in the six weeks to September 9 were up 5.5%, a "reasonable" start to the year.
Wetherspoon's opened six pubs during its year, with 18 sold or closed, resulting in a trading estate of 883 pubs at end of its 2018 financial year.
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