Subscriber login Close [x]
remember me
You are not logged in.

UK pub and restaurant sales up 10.7% in January

Published:  14 February, 2011

UK restaurant and pub groups performed well in January, with like-for-like sales up 10.7% on the same period last year, according to monthly sales monitoring report the Coffer Peach Business Tracker. 

UK restaurant and pub groups performed well in January, with like-for-like sales up 10.7% on the same period last year, according to monthly sales monitoring report the Coffer Peach Business Tracker.


Total sales, including the effect of new openings, were up 11.4%. December like-for-like sales were down 4.2% on 2009 because of adverse weather.


"The positive news this past month will be tempered by the fact that January last year was itself badly affected by snow with like-for-like sales then down 5% on 2009," said Peach Factory's Peter Martin. "However, the double-digit recovery this year more than compensates for that and will encourage operators into hoping that this performance may be more than just a readjustment."


"January is traditionally a slow trading period, and month-on-month sales were down -28.5% on December," added Martin. "However, we are comparing the four trading weeks of January with the five of December, so it is actually not a bad result at all."


Jonathan Leinster, head of European leisure and tobacco research at UBS Investment Bank, said that it appeared that the rise in VAT was a non-event for the eating-out sector. "We believe that most operators increased food prices with their autumn menus so only drinks prices would have appeared to customers to been affected by the VAT rise," he added.


"Some of this month's rise is a catch-up from a year ago and promotions would have been more effective this January when customers were snow-bound a year ago. On a two year basis, the compound annual growth in like-for-like sales has been 2.5% for January," said Leinster.


The report, produced on a monthly basis by Peach Factory in partnership with KPMG, UBS and the Coffer Group, monitors sales performance across 18 major pub and restaurant operators, including Mitchells & Butlers, Whitbread, Pizza Hut, Punch Pub Co, Gondola and Tragus.

Keywords: