Whitbread PLC
13 December 2006
13th December 2006
Whitbread PLC Trading Statement
Today, Whitbread PLC announces that total sales for Continuing Whitbread* for
the first 39 weeks of its financial year to 30 November 2006 have grown by 10.1%
and like for like sales have grown by 3.9%.
Sales for 39 weeks to 30 November 2006
% change vs prior year
Like-for-Like Total
Premier Travel Inn 7.7 16.3
Pub Restaurants 0.0 2.1
David Lloyd Leisure 2.6 5.8
Costa 5.9 22.1
Continuing Whitbread* at week 39 3.9 10.1
Continuing Whitbread* at week 24 2.9 9.1
Alan Parker, Chief Executive, Whitbread PLC comments:
'This has been a good quarter's trading across the Group with all four
businesses generating a positive increase in sales.
Premier Travel Inn's growth has strengthened with total sales up 16.3%. In the
first 39 weeks we have opened 1,640 Premier Travel Inn rooms, which includes 14
new build hotels and 9 extensions to existing hotels. We remain on target to
open 2,500 rooms in this financial year.
Pub Restaurants have improved with a total sales increase of 2.1% and positive
recent like for like sales growth. This results from our strategy of focusing on
joint pub restaurant and Premier Travel Inn sites, new menus offering improved
quality and better value and the continued refurbishment of the estate. This
year 58 restaurants have been remodelled.
David Lloyd Leisure has delivered a 5.8% increase in sales on a stable like for
like membership base. New initiatives introduced this year have had a positive
impact on retail sales per member.
Costa has seen total sales up 22.1%. 137 new stores have been opened (116 net of
closures), including 56 equity and 81 franchise stores, 46 of which were
overseas. This week Costa celebrated the opening of its 500th UK store in
Oxford. Internationally it has opened its first store in Eastern Europe and will
open in China in Shanghai by Christmas.
These results demonstrate that we continue to make improvements in operating
performance. We are driving rapid expansion in our Premier Travel Inn and Costa
businesses and the ongoing turnaround at David Lloyd Leisure is encouraging. I
am particularly pleased by the first signs of improvement in Pub Restaurants.'
-ends-
* Sales of continuing Whitbread comprise Premier Travel Inn, the retained Pub
Restaurant estate, David Lloyd Leisure and Costa, but exclude the 239 disposed
Pub Restaurant sites, the Pizza Hut joint Venture, TGI Fridays which is listed
as an asset held for sale, Supply Chain sales to third parties, and other sales
related to Marriott.
Conference call for analysts and investors
Alan Parker and Christopher Rogers will be available for a conference call at
8.30am today (UK time). To participate, dial +44 (0)20 7138 0836
A recording of the conference call will be available for seven days. To listen,
dial +44 (0)20 7806 1970 and enter the passcode 4185869#
For more information please contact:
Investor Relations:
Christopher Rogers, Group Finance Director +44 (0) 1582 889 422
Media:
Anna Glover, Whitbread PLC +44 (0) 1582 844 439
Andrew Grant, Tulchan +44 (0) 20 7353 4200
This information is provided by RNS
The company news service from the London Stock Exchange
*A Private Investor is a recipient of the information who meets all of the conditions set out below, the recipient:
Obtains access to the information in a personal capacity;
Is not required to be regulated or supervised by a body concerned with the regulation or supervision of investment or financial services;
Is not currently registered or qualified as a professional securities trader or investment adviser with any national or state exchange, regulatory authority, professional association or recognised professional body;
Does not currently act in any capacity as an investment adviser, whether or not they have at some time been qualified to do so;
Uses the information solely in relation to the management of their personal funds and not as a trader to the public or for the investment of corporate funds;
Does not distribute, republish or otherwise provide any information or derived works to any third party in any manner or use or process information or derived works for any commercial purposes.
Please note, this site uses cookies. Some of the cookies are essential for parts of the site to operate and have already been set. You may delete and block all cookies from this site, but if you do, parts of the site may not work. To find out more about the cookies used on Investegate and how you can manage them, see our Privacy and Cookie Policy
To continue using Investegate, please confirm that you are a private investor as well as agreeing to our Privacy and Cookie Policy & Terms.