Shake-up at greenalls

Greenalls Group, which announced the £518m acquisition of the Boddington Group in October, is rationalising its range of pub brands and shuffling its hotel portfolio.

Out will go the 18 Hudson's, a Greenalls brand, to be converted to Henrys Table, which came from Boddington. The seven County Fayres, another Boddington brand, are being changed to the Greenalls-developed Miller's Kitchen.

All Boddington's lodges are being converted to Premier Lodges. Another two properties are opening in Cheshire in January next year, the 30-bedroom Rising Sun at Macclesfield and the Cat & Lion at Warrington, which also has 30 bedrooms.

But the Premier Lodge at South Marston, near Swindon, Wiltshire, is to be converted to Boddington's Village Leisure brand, making it the first non-purpose-built Village.

Paul Dermody, the deputy chairman at De Vere Hotels, said the next target for a Village Leisure site, once the Leeds and Cardiff schemes were open, would be in Edinburgh.

Greenalls revealed the changes earlier this week as it reported pre-tax profits up 18% to £100.5m from a turnover up 8.2% to £760m, for the year to 29 September.

At De Vere Hotels, operating profit was up 11.2% to £22m from sales ahead 7.3% at £104m. The group's US hotels raised operating profits by 43.1% to £1.1m from a turnover down 1.7% to £15m.

Occupancy at De Vere improved from 68% to 71%, while room rate jumped 6.9% to £50.

The Premier Lodges saw occupancy advance from 66% to 72% on a room rate 4.5% ahead at £29.

The 137 branded managed pubs within Premier House increased food sales by 15.6%. Operating profit was up 6.8% to £17.5m on a turnover up 7.5% to £86.7m.

The pub division, Greenalls Inns, reported a 9.4% increase in profits to £83m from sales up 3.6% to £291m.