Fuller, Smith & Turner hails Christmas trading as maintains momentum

Fuller, Smith & Turner PLC on Thursday celebrated an ‘excellent Christmas trading period’ as it approved a further share buyback programme.

The London-based pubs and hotels group said like-for-like sales rose 5.3% in the 41 weeks to January 10. For the 41 weeks to January 11, 2025, the firm had reported like-for-like sales growth of 5.9%.

The firm said it had an ‘outstanding’ five-week Christmas and New Year period, delivering like-for-like sales growth of 8.2% against a ‘strong’ prior year, when it had reported an increase of 10%. Fuller expects to complete its existing buyback of one million A shares in the coming days, and the board has approved a further programme for up to an additional one million A shares, to begin once the current tranche is finished.

Executive Chair Simon Emeny says: ‘I am delighted we have maintained our strong growth momentum – in both sales and profitability – and this has been further enhanced with an excellent Christmas trading period. In addition to this outstanding operational performance, we continue to effectively deliver on our capital allocation framework with the ongoing share buyback programme and through our extensive programme of capital investment, with a number of exciting investment schemes scheduled for the final quarter of this financial year.’

The company will publish results for the financial year ending March 28 on June 10.

Fuller shares rose 2.4% to 727.12 pence each on Thursday afternoon in London.

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