INTERIM RESULTS FOR THE 26 WEEKS ENDED 30 JUNE 2012
Greggs is the leading bakery retailer in the UK, with over 1,600 shops throughout the country, serving freshly baked food to six million customers each week
NEW SHOPS AND NEW CHANNELS DRIVE SALES GROWTH
- Sales up 4.5% to £350m (2011: £335m): like-for-like sales down 2.3%
- Pre-tax profit down £0.8m to £16.5m (2011: £17.3m*)
- Dividend per share up 3.4% to 6.0p (2011: 5.8p)
- 33 net new shops opened, on track for net 90 during year
- Sales through Iceland Foods exceeding expectations
- Motorway services shops to expand to 30 Moto sites creating an additional 500 jobs
"Our total sales growth of 4.5 per cent reflects the good performance from our new shop opening programme and strong growth in wholesale volumes. The market remained challenging and was particularly impacted by the record levels of rainfall in the second quarter with UK High Street footfall down over 7 per cent**. Greggs was not immune to this and our like-for-like sales fell by 3.5 per cent in the second quarter and by 2.3 per cent in the first half overall.
Our tight control of costs and the added contribution from wholesale partially mitigated the profit impact, resulting in a £0.8 million (4.5 per cent) decline in first half profits.
Conditions for consumers are likely to remain challenging in the second half and we will therefore continue our focus on delivering outstanding value for our customers. In addition we will make the Greggs brand more accessible to new customers through our shop opening programme and further development of our wholesaling and franchising channels.
We continue to make strong progress towards our strategic goals and remain confident in our ability to deliver long term profitable growth for the benefit of shareholders, employees and the wider community."
