Whitbread sees 8.6% total sales growth for Q3 2016
Hospitality giant Whitbread saw a total sales growth of 8.6% and like-for-like sales increase 1.7% for the third quarter last year, according to its trading statement on performance to 1 December 2016.
Premier Inn grew total sales for the 39 weeks to 1 December by 9%, growing like-for-like sales by 2.2%. Total revpar was down 0.7% due to the impact of the brand's hotel extensions programme. Total occupancy remained high at 83.2%, while the number of rooms available increased by 9.5%. Revpar for the total market was down 0.3%, with the non-budget sector supported by a weaker sterling and higher inbound tourism to London.
Restaurants delivered total sales growth for the 39 weeks of 0.5% with like-for-like sales down 0.2%, slightly ahead of a soft pub restaurant market outside the M25.
Costa had another good sales performance, growing total system sales for the 39 weeks by 13% to £1.3b. It delivered total sales growth of 12.5% in the quarter and good like for like sales growth of 4.3%, supported by its new advertising and promotional campaigns and benefitting from a strong start to the Christmas period.
Alison Brittain, chief executive of Whitbread, said: "Trading since the end of the quarter is such that we expect to deliver full year results in line with expectations.
"Our property strategy is to carry out a modest number of sale and lease back transactions in order to recycle capital into strong returning new growth opportunities and we successfully completed two such transactions in December. We now expect total sale proceeds for the year to be in the region of £200m. These transactions highlight the strong asset backing to our balance sheet and are evidence of how we optimise our significant property portfolio."
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